As the courts resume proceedings following the summer break, attention will likely now be focused on whether the dispute between solicitors and the Minister for Justice regarding the change in payments under the Legal Aid scheme can be resolved.
The new payment structure under the Legal Aid scheme was brought in on 1 July last, and means solicitors are now paid a single, flat fee of €520 per client, rather than being paid for every time a defendant is represented in court.
This has meant that cases at all levels of courts in Ireland – including District, Circuit and Central Criminal, have been adjourned as a large number of solicitors have chosen to only represent juvenile clients or those who are already in custody in protest at the change.
A number of cases in Waterford were block-adjourned throughout the summer as a result of the protest, with defendants being told to come back at a later date despite being present in court.
Waterford solicitor Ken Cunningham previously told The Munster Express in June 2026 that the proposed reform of the criminal legal aid system isn’t ‘feasible’ or ‘sustainable.’
Mr. Cunningham said District Court cases “can be much more complex than people would expect” and include matters such as theft, cases where a defendant requires a psychiatric report and could be waiting months for this to be completed, or where multiple appearances are needed when directions are awaited in a case to decide if a matter can stay in the District Court or be sent to a higher court.
There have been widespread concerns over cases being delayed as a result of the protest, with one particular fear centring around access to justice for defendants who may solely rely on legal aid to secure representation.
Mick McNeill is an expert on family law based in Scotland, with family ties to Co. Kilkenny. He has warned that cuts to the legal aid system in England and Wales have resulted in solicitors and barristers refusing to take on the cases of legally aided clients, which as a result, “has blocked the courts and packed the prisons.”
With overcrowding already a significant problem in Irish prisons, Mr. McNeill has warned that similar problems in the legal systems in England and Wales could become issues in Ireland. This would include more remand prisoners being held in custody before they are convicted due to being unable to secure legal representation.
In England and Wales, the average cost of keeping a prisoner in custody was £60,018 sterling in 2024 / 2025, according to Mr. McNeill. He added that figures published in October 2025, show that the remand prison population was 17,700.
Mr. McNeill said: “Obviously, the longer a prisoner is held on remand before trial the more costly it becomes to detain them at the tax payer’s expense. Also, the longer it takes to bring a case to a Final Hearing, the more likely it is that the case will collapse due to the withdrawal of key witnesses for example.
“It is worth remembering that remand prisoners are quite rightly regarded as innocent until proven guilty. Many who have been detained for extended periods of time will be ‘free to go’ when their case finally comes to court. One definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results,” he added.
According to figures from the Irish Prison Service, as of last Friday 4 September, a total of 5,532 prisoners were in custody across Ireland’s 14 prisons. A total of 1,026 people from this figure are currently on trial or remand and 264 are sleeping on mattresses on the floor due to overcrowding.
Almost all of Ireland’s prisons are operating at 100% capacity or over, according to the figures. The only detention centre currently operating below capacity is Shelton Abbey in Wicklow, where 109 prisoners are currently in custody, which is below its figure of 121 beds.
Mr. McNeill said that looking at England and Wales, around a fifth of the number of people currently in prison have not been convicted of anything. In 2024, the number of prisoners on remand passed 17,000, which was the highest number in 50 years, with this number expected to sit at around 18,200 this month.
“That number is not set by sentencing policy,” Mr. McNeill explained. “It is set by the Crown Court backlog, which the Ministry of Justice expects to rise from 78,329 open cases in September 2025 to 88,700 this September, to 108,700 by 2028, those are the [British] Government’s own figures rather than a campaign group’s.”
He added: “A large part of the overcrowding everyone is shouting about was never a decision anyone made about punishment. It is a queue. The prison is absorbing the failure of the court, because it is the only part of the system that cannot decline. A court can list a case for 2029. A police force can leave a crime unattended. A prison cannot pin a note to the gate saying back in 10 minutes.”
Minister O’Callaghan has defended the reforms to the scheme over the past number of months, and said as recently as last week that criminal courts are “running effectively.”
The Law Society of Ireland has been highly critical of the changes since their introduction, with representatives engaging with Minister O’Callaghan in negotiations, which resulted in an increase in the flat-fee from the previously proposed figure of €455.
However, President of the Law Society Rosemarie Loftus said that after a meeting with solicitors at the end of July, practitioners acknowledged some of the changes as ‘progress’, but feedback still indicated that changes did not address “significant practical concerns” underlying the current difficulties.
Ms. Loftus said: “The consistent message we continue to receive is that most practitioners would likely participate in the scheme on an interim basis if a small number of targeted corrections and adjustments were made while the broader review is undertaken.”
In a letter sent to Minister O’Callaghan at the end of July, the Law Society highlighted two issues identified by the solicitors, which included the treatment of “separate and distinct” cases which happen to be before the court on the same day. Only one legal aid certificate is issued in such a case, but Ms. Loftus provided an example of a defendant charged with three offences involving separate times and locations. This would require separate preparation, consultation with the client, examination of evidence, legal analysis and representation, Ms. Loftus said.
The second issue for solicitors concerned complex cases, which could involve children, people with mental health issues or people remanded in custody. The Law Society pointed out that under the new scheme, a solicitor who represented in court for a non-complex matter would be paid the same as someone who represented a troubled child in a complex case involving more than 20 court appearances.
The Law Society proposed that a separate legal aid certificate could be issued where a case exceeds 10 court appearances.
Ms. Loftus concluded by highlighting that as of the week beginning 31 August, the Law Society has still not received a response to the letter sent to Minister O’Callaghan highlighting these issues.
She said: “Our objective remains clear: to enable criminal legal-aid solicitors to return to work, while ensuring that every person has fair and equal access to justice – a right we are all committed to protecting.”
Funded by the Court Reporting Scheme Robyn Power
