ABSTRACT
This chapter concentrates on ways in which individual consumers can seek redress. The funding of legal services was sharply changed following the White Paper, Modernising Justice, and the enactment of the Access to Justice Act 1999. Cases brought under a conditional fee arrangement (CFA) might be assisted by support funding to help with investigative support or litigation support to perhaps help with expensive disbursements, such as experts' fees, which it would be unrealistic to expect lawyers to meet on a CFA basis. The New South Wales Legal Aid Board in Australia developed a different strategy and with limited resources concentrated on finding cases which highlighted the significant problems consumers faced. Certain perennial questions are raised about the role and functions of small claims courts. As part of the Civil Justice Review the Lord Chancellor's Department commissioned management consultants Touche Ross to undertake an empirical study of the operation of the small claims court.
