Equality Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 138:"Page 18, line 22, leave out paragraph (b)." The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 138, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 139 and 162. The effect of this group of amendments is to ensure that the Government’s policy that the commission should be able to recover its costs or expenses from an award made to an individual whose case is supported by the commission works in Scotland as it does in England and Wales. It relates to any case where an individual might receive assistance for legal proceedings from both the commission and the Scottish Legal Aid Board. While that is likely to be rare, it has occurred with the existing commissions, and it is most likely to occur where the Scottish Legal Aid Board supports a case at one stage of the legal process and the commission supports it at another, for example, on appeal. There is currently a statutory impediment in Scotland that does not apply in England and Wales. Amendment No. 138 removes the existing provision in relation to Scotland, which is considered not to work. Amendment No. 139 substitutes an improved provision that makes clear that the provisions of Clause   32 shall not affect the operation of Section 17(2A) of the Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 1986. Amendment No. 162 is an amendment to Schedule 3, which deals with amendments that are consequential to Part 1 of the Bill. The effect of the amendments to the Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 1986 is to remove the statutory impediment that prevents the Scottish Legal Aid Board paying out the surplus of an award of expenses after it has recovered its own costs. Accepting the amendment will enable the commission to recover its costs from an award made to a litigant to whom it has offered mixed support with the Scottish Legal Aid Board, after the Scottish Legal Aid Board has recovered its own costs. I beg to move. On Question, amendment agreed to.