PENDLE MP Gordon Prentice has stoked up the row about the Government's legal aid cuts by claiming they restrict access to the law to the rich.

As the Government published its latest proposals in a White Paper, Mr Prentice lashed Justice Minister Gary Streeter after he admitted that the percentage of households qualified for legal aid in civil cases had fallen from 74 per cent in 1979 to 48 per cent now.

Mr Prentice said in the Commons: "It is appalling that the number of households eligible for legal aid should drop from more than three quarters in 1979 to less than half now.

"It is an incontestable fact that the only people who can get legal aid now are those on the breadline and that the income cut-off is £7,403 a year.

"It is a case of justice denied when the only people who can get access to the courts are those whose wallets or purses are fat enough."

But Mr Streeter said the number of households eligible had fallen as living standards rose and that legal aid has helped 3.5 million cases since 1979.

But Mr Prentice said: "Millions of working people whose taxes fund the legal aid scheme received nothing in return from it and are denied access to justice by Britain's high legal services costs. They look to the law for help and it is not there."

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