Alexy Buck is Acting Head of the LSRC. She has extensive experience of leading, conducting, and managing policy-driven research impacting on social programme development in the public sector. Alexy holds a first class honours degree in Social and Political Sciences from the University of Cambridge and an MSc in Social Psychology from the London School of Economics (LSE). She also has a Diploma in Management from the University of London. Alexy leads on a range of LSRC projects, including the multi-phased evaluation of debt outreach advice. She is closely involved in the development of the English and Welsh Civil and Social Justice Survey. Her project on legal aid eligibility, conducted in collaboration with the Institute for Fiscal Studies, resulted in a new civil means test in 2001. Alexy regularly publishes in a range of peer-reviewed journals, presents at national and international conferences, and sits on external research advisory groups. Her particular interests are social and financial exclusion, debt, and education issues. In 2004, Alexy was awarded a T. H. Marshall Fellowship in European Social Policy from the LSE, studying civic education whilst based at the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB). Publications include: Do Citizens Know How to Deal with Legal Issues? Some Empirical Insights (2008, Journal of Social Policy), The Policy-Demand for Social Research in Civil Justice: The UK Perspective (2007, The German Journal of Law and Society), Education Implications from the English and Welsh Civil and Social Justice Survey (2007, Public Legal Education and Support Taskforce), Social Exclusion and Civil Law: Experience of Civil Justice Problems Among Vulnerable Groups (2005, Social Policy and Administration), Simplicity Versus Fairness in Means Testing: The Case of Civil Legal Aid (2003, Fiscal Studies).

Pascoe Pleasence, Head of the Legal Services Research Centre, is currently on Sabbatical. He has degrees in Philosophy (UCL) and Criminology (Cambridge) and has practised at the Bar. He also holds the position of Professor of Empirical Legal Studies at University College London, as well as being a Government Social Research Head of Profession, a member of the Tribunals Service Research Advisory Group, a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society and on the Editorial Board of the Law and Society Review. His research interests span the civil and criminal justice systems and extend to jurisprudence and the policy process. He has been invited to present papers in countries including Japan, the United States, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Italy and France. He has been involved in all LSRC projects since its inception in 1996 and retains personal responsibility for the English and Welsh Civil and Social Justice Survey. Recent publications include Causes of Action: Civil Law and Social Justice (2006, TSO) Civil Law Problems and Morbidity (2004, Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health), and After Universalism: Re-Engineering Access to Justice (2003, Blackwells).

Dr Marisol Smith is Acting Deputy Head of the LSRC. She has a Ph.D. from the University of Sussex, a BA (Hons) in Economics and European Studies and an MA in Development Economics. Marisol has previously led the Legal Services Commission's Planning and Partnership Development team in the South Eastern Region and was also a Lecturer in Economics at the University of East Anglia. Marisol's expertise in economics has been highly influential in the LSRC's work on measuring the social, economic and health consequences of civil justice problems. Her most recent work has looked at the cost and effectiveness of outreach advice. Marisol had overall responsibility for the European Social Fund financed research on the publicly funded legal advice sector workforce in England and Wales. Marisol's current work streams include spatial dimensions of ‘legal need’ and service delivery and research on Community Legal Advice Centres and Networks. Her research interests also include geodemographic profiling, performance measurement systems and small area needs.

Vicky Kemp is a Principal Researcher at the Legal Services Research Centre (LSRC), the independent research arm of the Legal Services Commission. She has a Ph.D. in criminology from the University of Cambridge and maintains close links with the Institute of Criminology in Cambridge. Vicky has previously worked as a practitioner within a criminal firm of solicitors, as a community safety co-ordinator and also as a policy-maker within the former Legal Aid Board. In this role, she was a member of the Home Office Trial Issues sub-group on piloting provisions to reduce delays at court. On moving to the LSRC, Vicky’s first project was to develop a ‘whole-systems’ approach when examining the processing of cases within a county’s Youth Courts. Current projects include a follow up observational study of Adult Courts, which have recently implemented the new ‘simple, speedy, summary’ justice arrangements, and a study of ‘users' of the criminal justice system to determine their understanding of their legal rights and their choice of a solicitor. Recent publications include The Relationship Between Youth Justice and Child Welfare in England and Wales (with Bottoms, A.) (2006, in Hill, A., Lockyer, A. and Stone, F. (eds.) Youth Justice and Child Protection), Youth Justice: Discretion in Pre-Court Decision Making (2003, in Gelsthorpe, L. and Padfield, N. (eds) Exercising Discretion: Decision Making in the Criminal Justice System and Beyond) and Assessing responses to Youth Justice in Northamptonshire, (2002, Kemp et al., NACRO Briefing).