Legal Aid Agency
The deadline for CRM12 submissions to gain duty solicitor slots under the new 2017 Crime Contract starting 1 April 2017 is 11.59pm on 13 January 2017.
The CRM12 forms you need to return will be issued through the Bravo e-tendering system to organisations passing the initial stage of the verification process for their offices under the 2017 Standard Crime Contract procurement process.
The initial stage of the verification process had to be completed by 11.59pm on 12 December for all organisations which wanted to join the April 2017 rota.
This rota runs until 30 June 2017 and the CRM12 form needs to be sent to: CRM12@legalaid.gsi.gov.uk
Completing the CRM12
Organisations sent a CRM12 will be required to provide details of all duty solicitors they wish to nominate for inclusion on relevant duty schemes from 1 April 2017.
They need to confirm their organisation will:
- meet contractual attendance requirements for its solicitors
- only nominate duty solicitors who carry out 14 hours contract work a week from office for which rota slots are held
- only nominate duty solicitors that are not named for rota slots with another organisation
Compliance against these requirements will be monitored throughout the contract period.
Where LAA receives CRM12s from multiple organisations for the same duty solicitor it will not take into account that duty solicitor for the April rotas.
It will contact affected organisations to advise that they resolve any disputes as to which CRM12 should be accepted so the duty solicitor may be taken into account for the July rotas.
Send applications before deadline
Organisations should submit applications in good time to ensure compliance. CRM12s received by noon on Monday 9 January 2017, will go through initial checks and the LAA will contact organisations about missing information.
LAA will not check CRM12s received after 9 January. Organisations should note that non-compliant information submitted after this time may result in delayed or rejected applications.
See below for a link to our crime tender page where there is a full breakdown of all required information and our approach to non-compliance.
Second rota period
This starts on 1 July 2017 and runs until 31 December 2017. Verification for this rota needs to be completed by 28 February 2017 and CRM12s submitted by 11.59pm on 17 March 2017. LAA will run a separate CRM12 process for July rotas, and further details will be provided in due course.
Additional duty solicitors
Organisations allocated rota slots from 1 April and/or 1 July 2017 will be unable to add any additional duty solicitors for these rotas. However, they will be able to replace duty solicitors leaving the organisation during that period.
For subsequent rotas, the rules set out in section 6 of the 2017 Standard Crime Contract specification apply.
Further information
CRM12@legalaid.gsi.gov.uk to return completed CRM12