Legal aid duty-scheme fees, now in public consultation: progress not yet approved

Some back-office news deserves an editorial, even when it arrives in the form of a procedural step. On 20 October, public consultation opened on the ministerial Order updating the fees of the legal aid duty scheme in Ministry territory - the actions listed in Annex II of the Legal Aid Regulation approved by Royal Decree 141/2021 - and the figures the draft puts on the table, added to the rise already approved in 2025, are significant: a 16.6% cumulative increase across the board, 79.7% for the defence of criminal cases of special complexity and 33.1% in ordinary criminal proceedings, if the text is approved as presented. It also lands on an already reinforced Regulation: Royal Decree 824/2026, of 14 October, has amended the 2021 text to guarantee immediate assistance to especially vulnerable victims, create compensation for appropriate dispute resolution mechanisms - 25% above the judicial proceeding's - raise settlements from 75% to 125% and open free legal aid in insolvency to micro-enterprises. According to the Spanish legal profession's council, the reform adds 16 modules that did not exist in 2018.

It should be said first and clearly: this is good news, even if for now it is a proposal under consultation. The duty scheme upholds the right to a defence for those who cannot pay for one, and for years its remuneration was documentary proof that the system took the work of thousands of lawyers for granted. Every point of improvement in those fees is, in truth, a point of improvement in the quality of the public service, because a badly paid duty scheme is one that drives good professionals out.

What the rise says - and what it leaves unsaid

A careful reading of the percentages is revealing. That the largest proposed rise is concentrated in criminal cases of special complexity acknowledges something every duty lawyer knows: the complexity of the case was not being paid for. A trial for serious offences, with its hearings, its investigation phase and its pressure, cannot be paid like a simple appearance, and the new modules - victims, ADR, insolvency - recognise work that was already being done without economic recognition. In that, the direction is the right one: pay for real work, not abstract categories.

But the same news confirms what remains pending. The update is being processed by ministerial Order, the short road of the fee schedule, because the legislative reform of legal aid is still not complete. The fee schedule is the tariff; the law is the architecture: specialised schemes, appointment criteria, quality control, stability. A system that improves its tariffs without reforming its structure moves forward, but at half throttle.

The test will be specialisation

The underlying question is not how much fees are proposed to rise, but whether the duty scheme becomes what it must be: a specialised and dignified service. Specialisation is paid for and demanded at once: whoever defends a complex criminal case should accredit criminal-law training and experience, and whoever accredits it should find in the fee schedule an incentive to keep doing so. If the new modules serve that purpose - aligning pay, demand and quality - they will have been worth the wait. If they remain an accounting adjustment, the debate will return, as it always does, with every unfilled appointment list and every lawyer who leaves the rota.

The Spanish legal profession's Commission for Legal Aid and Social Function, chaired by Ángel Méndez, will submit its observations on the draft. Ours, from here: let approval not be delayed, let the final text not cut what has been announced, and let the law's reform resume its path. The right to a defence has no off-season.

To go deeper into the model, we recommend our analysis of the duty scheme's remuneration model, and other editorials from this house on continuous training as a competitive advantage, the lawyer's early specialisation and clear language as a professional obligation. All of them, in the opinion section.