Clampdown on lawyers overcharging NHS in clinical negligence cases

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/jun/27/nhs-clinical-negligence-cases-clampdown-lawyers

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Ministers are to clamp down on lawyers who overcharge the NHS in clinical negligence cases – earning in some cases 10 times the amount their client receives in compensation – by setting a cap on their fees.

As part of a Department of Health plan to save the NHS up to £80m a year, legal costs for claims up to £100,000 would be fixed. The lawyer’s fee would reflect a percentage of the compensation received by the patient.

The health minister, Ben Gummer, is pushing through the changes in a bid to reduce the £259m bill for legal fees paid out over clinical negligence claims in 2013/14.

There is currently no limit on legal fees even if the compensation claim is small, meaning lawyers can claim extortionate fees for low-cost cases.

In one case, a source at the Department of Health said a lawyer pocketed £175,000 while the patient received just £11,800 in damages. In another, the legal bill was more than £80,000 while the patient only received £1,000, although the legal bill was later reduced to less than £5,000 by the courts after a successful challenge by the NHS Litigation Authority (NHS LA).

The NHS LA saved the health service more than £74m by challenging excessive legal costs in 2013/14, but the proposals to put strict limits on legal bills will help them further. Limits have already been introduced for other areas of personal injury claims, such as road traffic accidents, and employer and public liability.

Ministers are considering detailed proposals ahead of a formal consultation in the autumn.

The savings accompany a £2bn budget increase for the NHS this year set out by the chancellor, George Osborne, in his autumn statement, and a further £8bn increase by 2020, which was requested in the NHS’ own long-term plan.