Ferrys Solicitors partner Tony Collier gave the Irish Times the criminal defence solicitors' assessment on July 17, 2026, in a report that also revealed a separate dispute brewing among family law legal aid practitioners. Our criminal defence solicitors and family law solicitors both act for clients who depend on legal aid, so this development touches two areas of the firm's work.
Mr Collier said solicitors in Dublin "remain resolute" in opposition to the new legal aid regime and that he understood the situation was similar in Cork and the west. While some solicitors never joined the protest, the largest providers of criminal legal aid were "committed" to it, he said.
"The Minister and his department have consistently tried to undermine and dismiss the level of protest and the extent of solicitor involvement in this dispute," he said.
His comments came on the day the Minister, Jim O'Callaghan, said he did not believe the departure of around 180 solicitors from the panel represented a big problem, pointing to about 850 solicitors on the panel and "a lot of claims activity". Ferrys' consistent response has been that the panel figure is inflated and that the firms doing the bulk of the work have withdrawn.
Family law legal aid: a second front
The Irish Times reported that lawyers on the family law legal aid private practitioners panel had written to the Minister seeking "meaningful" engagement on pay and civil legal aid reform by the end of the following week, failing which they may stop taking new family legal aid cases while honouring existing assignments.
The family flat fee ranges from €339 for a single application, such as child maintenance or access, to €508 for applications for several orders including domestic violence. Family lawyers say there has been no increase in over 20 years and that the fee does not allow for adjournments or reflect the number of appearances involved.
Why this matters to Ferrys' clients
Ferrys Solicitors practises in both criminal defence and family law. The people who depend on legal aid in the family courts, for maintenance, custody, guardianship and domestic violence orders, are often the same families whose members the firm represents in the criminal courts. If the Legal Aid Board has to redeploy lawyers from other work to cover emergency domestic violence applications, the effect will be felt across every area of civil legal aid.
Ferrys' view is that both disputes stem from the same cause: flat fees set without regard to the work involved, introduced without substantive engagement with the profession.
The criminal dispute, meanwhile, was set to escalate with a two-day action the following week aimed at a near-total shutdown of the criminal courts.