5
Legal Aid (Amendment) Bill 1995 gazetted
The Legal Aid (Amendment) Bill 1995 was gazetted today (Friday). It will be introduced into the Legislative Council on January 25.
A Government spokesman said the Bill sought to implement a number of measures to improve the provision of legal aid services recommended by an inter-departmental working group.
The report of the working group was published last July after the recommendations in it had been approved by the Governor-in-Council.
"The recommendations will meet the public demand for greater access to legal aid," the spokesman added.
"The Bill proposes an expansion of the scopes of both the standard legal aid scheme and the Supplementary Legal Aid Scheme for the 'sandwich' cases," he said.
"It also proposes that the Director of Legal Aid should also be given the discretion to waive the means test in meritorious civil Bill of Rights (BOR) cases, and that legal aid should be extended to assist individuals to pursue election petitions on BOR grounds."
The working group's recommendations relating to the establishment of an independent Legal Aid Services Council are not dealt with in the present Bill.
"This will be the subject of a separate Bill," the spokesman explained.
End/Friday, January 13, 1995