Your recent article on government plans to reduce criminal legal aid for prison law cases (Society, 24 April) is confused about the type of cases where prisoners would no longer be able to obtain a publicly funded lawyer. Our consultation paper proposes stopping legal aid where issues can be dealt with by the existing complaints system ? like a prisoner appealing against the category of prison in which they are held, or a decision to move them to a different section within a prison, or taking legal action over issues like visits or correspondence. The prison discipline procedures and probation complaints system are also available for issues to be resolved efficiently and effectively. We believe our proposal will save taxpayers about £4m and reduce by about 11,000 the number of legally aided cases brought by prisoners each year.

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