{"id":522976,"date":"2026-06-28T18:05:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-28T18:05:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/522976\/"},"modified":"2026-06-28T18:05:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-28T18:05:19","slug":"minister-to-look-at-increasing-new-fees-for-solicitors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/522976\/","title":{"rendered":"Minister to look at increasing new fees for solicitors"},"content":{"rendered":"

Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan has said he will be looking to see whether he can increase the new set fee of \u20ac455 for solicitors for criminal legal aid work.<\/p>\n

The legal system has ground to a halt in recent days as thousands of District Court cases have been adjourned after criminal defence solicitors withdrew their services in protest at proposed changes to how they are paid.<\/p>\n

Currently, a solicitor is paid for each court appearance, starting at \u20ac239.38, and then \u20ac59.86 for each subsequent hearing.<\/p>\n

From 1 July, a new set fee of \u20ac455 will be payable regardless of how many court appearances there are – removing the link between payments and the number of appearances for solicitors.<\/p>\n

Speaking on RT\u00c9’s This Week programme, Mr O’Callaghan said the new fee will still come into effect on Wednesday but he will look to see whether he can increase it.<\/p>\n

\"criminal
\nCriminal defence solicitors have withdrawn their services in protest at proposed changes to how they are paid<\/p>\n

“I’m in discussions with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and the Minister [for Public Expenditure] Jack Chambers. I can’t make decisions like this on my own. I very much recognise and acknowledge the important role played by [the] legal profession,” Mr O’Callaghan.<\/p>\n

“I will be looking to see whether I can increase the \u20ac455 I have proposed initially,” he said.<\/p>\n

“I’m trying to get it up from \u20ac455,” he added.<\/p>\n

Mr O’Callaghan said there are currently inefficiencies and abuses of the current system and he had to change it.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the week, representatives of legal and human rights organisations expressed their opposition to what the Law Society says is an effective 20% cut to criminal legal aid<\/a>.<\/p>\n

President of the Law Society, Rosemary Loftus, said it was “hard to overstate” the level of anger among solicitors about the proposals.<\/p>\n

She said it was “deeply alarming” that the Government was proposing a 20% cut to criminal legal aid while imposing a model which she said had “demonstrably failed” in the family law area.<\/p>\n

She said the Government was implementing this proposal on the basis of anecdote and hearsay which she said was an insult to the legal profession and the public.<\/p>\n

She said it should be grounded in rigorous analysis and systematic evidence.<\/p>\n

Ms Loftus said the new proposal would make criminal legal aid practice financially unsustainable for many solicitors and she claimed it would trigger an exodus from the scheme.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan has said he will be looking to see whether he can increase the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":522977,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-522976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=522976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/522977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}