Law
Research Topic
Language: English
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- How do we best assist early advice and support services to deal with changes in legal need in the population and the demand for services? How do we measure the impact of early advice on short, medium, and longer-term outcomes, and the economic costs and benefits?
- How do individuals in the courts and tribunals system vary by, for example, protected characteristics, socio-economic or socio-demographic background? How do these characteristics compare across jurisdiction and case type?
- Where are the notable gaps in the provision of legal advice and support, and how can we best intervene to help fill them? How do different advice and support services interact, share information, and refer individuals between organisations?
- How sustainable are different types of role within the legal profession and sector? Particularly criminal defence and specialist legal roles such as mental health lawyers?
- How can we better understand drivers of demand in the justice system, so that we support early problem resolution where appropriate, whilst ensuring the formal justice system is accessible to those who need it?
- Constructing secure evidential cases against offenders in a changing technological context.
- How does LawTech affect the productivity, cost effectiveness, and efficiency of different services and outputs in the legal sector?
- What are the best practices for conducting pre-interview assessments to identify vulnerability or intimidation to determine appropriate ‘special measures’ and communication?
- How do we improve legal awareness and capability in the population, so that people are able to identify they have a legal problem and seek appropriate help?
- What novel research approaches can be deployed to help effectively measure the impact of online harm beyond typical quantitative survey methods? How could these be used to measure the wider impacts of Online Safety Legislation?
- What is claimants’ experience of the welfare disputes process (Mandatory Reconsiderations and Appeals) and how does it affect them?
- How might technology shape the future requirements of, and services offered by, the legal profession and sector? How can LawTech and innovation support greater access to justice?
- How do geographical and demographic factors affect legal aid awareness and uptake? How does legal aid uptake vary by eligibility?
- What are the barriers – including regulatory barriers – to legal services trade with the UK’s overseas markets and what levers can help overcome these?
- How can we better understand how problems link, interact, and reinforce, and how people move through different systems as they attempt to resolve them? Including unemployment, debt, housing, or family issues.
- How do different individuals and groups perceive their experiences of legal aid services? How does this vary by the nature of their legal problem, advice and support acquired, jurisdiction and outcome?
- What are the needs and experiences of victims, defence witnesses, and those in distressing civil, family, or tribunal cases? How does this vary by protected characteristics, socio-economic or socio-demographic background and jurisdiction?
- What are the outcomes of receiving legal aid, and how do they vary by the type of service and time at which they were provided? What are the long-term outcomes for those who access and those who do not, but are eligible for legal aid?
- Which groups struggle most to resolve their justice problems, either through inaction or difficulty accessing the justice system and wider support services?
- To what extent do alternative dispute resolutions – particularly mediation – affect outcomes for those involved? What works, for whom, to incentivise and deliver positive and sustainable outcomes?
- How can policing use advances in robotics to reduce or remove the need for police officers to enter hazardous environments e.g., water, fire, electrical, natural disaster, CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear)? Further, how can a seamless and secure operation be enabled in such environments?
- Barriers to prosecution and seizure of illicit profits, and approaches to ensuring victims receive adequate financial compensation through civil and criminal routes.
- What are the enablers to encouraging and sustaining greater diversity – in terms of protected characteristics and socio-economic background – in the legal profession, particularly within senior roles?
- How do geographic, demographic, cultural, and other factors affect people’s ability to resolve their legal problems?
- What legal and ethical challenges does the use of autonomous systems in policing face as robots become more able to operate independently?
- How well understood are entitlements under the Victims’ Code, including special measures and access to support services? How effective are these and how could we improve their effectiveness?
- What are people’s experiences of dealing with justice problems? How can they be supported to access and navigate the justice system, enforce their rights, and achieve the best outcomes? How does this vary by problem type, level of legal capability, and awareness of support?
- How do orders made in private family law proceedings – for example, resolving disputes about child or financial arrangements – affect individual and family outcomes? What works, for whom, to deliver positive and sustainable outcomes?
- How effective are support structures, for example intermediaries, in facilitating access to justice for vulnerable people, including victims and witnesses?
- How does protection of intellectual property by patents, trademarks or design rights affect trade flows in across industries and business sizes?
- What are the reasons for case attrition and what works to avoid it, for different case types? What are the impacts of case attrition on victims, particularly for serious violence and sexual abuse cases?
- How do the legal professions and services available within the legal sectors of Scotland and Northern Ireland compare with the legal profession in England and Wales?
- What are the legal activities of UK firms and legal professionals that are permanently established in non-EU, overseas and emerging markets?
- How can we minimise the harm to those engaging with the family justice system? What factors affect the effectiveness of Domestic Violence Protection Orders and other measures in the Domestic Abuse Bill?
- How can we better meet the needs of those with legal issues to resolve in either the civil or family justice system and the criminal justice system concurrently, for example, domestic abuse victims, victims of fraud, or defendants facing eviction?
- How can AI be used to identify harmful content?
- When people seek advice, how do we ensure they find useful and accessible information that empowers them – either towards self-help, or to access the most appropriate services for their needs?
- To what extent are intellectual property rights enforced where there is infringement, and how practices differ across sector and business size?
- How can we balance devolved responsibilities with the need to avoid a weakening of national guidelines/ standards?
- What are the key considerations for sustainable (all three pillars) and lawful deployment of pavement robots?
- How much specialist technological (LawTech) investment and adoption takes place in the legal sector? How does this differ by the type and size of legal firm or organisation, and for what services and outputs?
- How can we better understand flows into the courts and tribunals system, reasons for entry, and the impact of external organisations and their activities?
- How should government balance intellectual property with reproducible research in order to enable efficient digital innovation?
- How are tribunals affected by the policies and services of other government departments, and how can we better understand upstream decision-making processes? For example, regarding welfare policy.
- How do police activities – such as Release Under Investigation (RUI) – affect flows into the criminal courts?
- How effective are industry mechanisms and frameworks in ensuring they resolve complaints and meet the wider regulatory needs of the legal services market and profession?
- What impact do eligibility criteria for judicial roles have on recruitment and diversity, and does this enable sustainability of the judiciary? What motivates individuals to apply for, and remain within, judicial roles?
- What are the implications (for both safety and insurance) of people continuing to drive with high numbers of penalty points or immediately after serious offences (as only the courts can disqualify someone from driving)?
- How do organisations or other non-individual parties in the courts and tribunals system vary by, for example, size of organisation, nature of work or industry? How do these characteristics compare across case types?
- How does case progression, case timeliness, cost-to-access (where appropriate), and eventual outcome vary by jurisdiction and case type? What works, at which stage, and for whom, to improve the efficiency of case progression?
- What are the backgrounds of individuals who currently work within LawTech? How might future employment within the legal sector change because of technology and technological investment?
- How can we measure the quality of case outcomes across different jurisdictions, types of cases, and for the individuals and organisations involved? Including whether the court or tribunal was the ‘right’ method of resolution.
- What are the ethical considerations of LawTech and the enhanced usage of technology within the legal sector? What, if any, regulatory framework or guidelines are required to ensure the fair use and application of LawTech?
- What is the scale, scope and function of the unregulated legal services market in England and Wales?
- How can we define and measure procedural justice and (subjective) fairness? How does this vary by jurisdiction, and protected characteristics?