Access to Justice expert appointed to Legal Services Consumer Panel

Senior Lecturer in Law, Dr Daniel Newman has been appointed to the Legal Services Consumer Panel by The Legal Services Board (LSB).

The Legal Services Consumer Panel is an independent arm of The Legal Services Board, the oversight regulator of legal services. The Panel is made up of eight lay members whose appointments were approved by the Lord Chancellor and has a remit to represent the interests of consumers of legal services, including small businesses and charities, whilst also prioritising the needs of more vulnerable groups of consumers such as those with low levels of literacy, physical disabilities or mental health issues.

Dr Newman is well placed on the Panel as his research expertise focuses on access to justice, legal aid and the legal profession. He has taught at the School of Law and Politics since 2015 and currently teaches on the modules Crime, Law and Society, Global Problems and Legal Theory and Themes in Socio-Legal Studies.

Dr Newman will begin his tenure on the Panel on 14 March 2022. Chair of the Consumer Panel, Sarah Chambers, said, “I am delighted to welcome Daniel Newman to our Panel. His deep expertise in access to justice, advice deserts, Welsh affairs, vulnerability, and diversity issues will make a huge contribution to our agenda over the coming months and years.”

Dr Newman added, “I am so excited to be joining the Panel. In all my scholarship, I look to promote access to justice and working with the Panel gives me the opportunity to have wider impact again. The Panel’s vision to empower consumers of legal services is one that I share, and I hope to support the interests of consumers to make sure legal services function in a way they feel is fair. Nobody should be excluded from accessing justice, I will support the Panel to help ensure legal services can bring access to justice for all.”

Most recently, Dr Newman been working on the Legal Aid Census with Catrina Denvir, Jacqueline Kinghan, Jess Mant and Sasha Aristotle; the largest survey of legal aid lawyers ever conducted in England and Wales, which will soon be released by the Legal Aid Practitioners Group. His work on access to justice has been cited in the UK and Welsh parliaments, and he has appeared as an expert on access to justice across a range of media channels and mediums.