The Legal Aid in Criminal and Care Proceedings (General) (Amendment) Regulations 1998

Citation, commencement, interpretation and transitional provisions

1.—(1) These Regulations may be cited as the Legal Aid in Criminal and Care Proceedings (General) (Amendment) Regulations 1998 and shall come into force on 1st April 1998, except for regulations 16, 18 and 20 which shall come into force on 6th April 1998.

(2) In these Regulations, unless the context otherwise requires, a regulation or Schedule referred to by number means the regulation or Schedule so numbered in the Legal Aid in Criminal and Care Proceedings (General) Regulations 1989(1).

(3) Subject to paragraph (4), these Regulations shall apply to applications for legal aid made on or after 1st April 1998 and applications made before that date shall be treated as if these Regulations had not come into force.

(4) Regulations 16, 18 and 20 of these Regulations shall apply to applications for legal aid made on or after 6th April 1998 and applications made before that date shall be treated as if regulations 16, 18 and 20 had not come into force.

Amendments to the Legal Aid in Criminal and Care Proceedings (General) Regulations 1989

2.  In regulation 3(1), in the definition of “appropriate officer”, for the words “Chief Clerk”, there shall be substituted the words “Court Manager”.

3.  In regulation 4(1), after “Forms 1” there shall be inserted “, 1A”.

4.  In regulation 15(1), for “paragraph (2)”, there shall be substituted “paragraphs (2) and (3)”.

5.  After regulation 15(2), there shall be inserted the following—

“(3) An application for review shall not lie to an area committee where the offence is one of those mentioned in Schedule 2 to the Magistrates' Courts Act 1980(2) and by virtue of section 22 of that Act, the offence is triable only summarily.”.

6.  After regulation 22(1), there shall be inserted the following—

“(1A) Where section 44A of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968(3) (death of convicted person) applies and the applicant is the personal representative of the dead person, the application for legal aid shall be made to the registrar in Form 1A.”.

7.—(1) In the Arrangement of Regulations, after regulation 22, there shall be inserted the following—

“22A.   Reports by the Board”.

(2) After regulation 22, there shall be inserted the following—

“Reports by the Board

22A.— (1) Where the court or the proper officer is considering an application for a legal aid order or at any time after making a legal aid order, the court or the proper officer may refer an applicant, a legally assisted person or an appropriate contributor to the Board for a report on his financial resources.

(2) Where an application is referred under paragraph (1), the Board may make a report to the court or to the proper officer on the financial resources of the person referred to it.

(3) In compiling a report under this regulation, the Board may investigate the financial resources of the person referred to it and may require him to provide further evidence of any information given in a statement of means or of any change in his financial circumstances together with such additional information as the Board may require.”.

8.  After regulation 23(1), there shall be inserted the following—

“(1A) Where section 44A of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968 (death of convicted person) applies and the applicant is the personal representative of the dead person, the statement of means shall be in Form 1A and not in Form 5.”.

9.  In regulation 26(2A), for “23 or 24(1)”, there shall be substituted “23, 24(1) or 22A(3)”.

10.  In regulation 31, after the word “shall”, there shall be inserted the word “forthwith”.

11.  In regulation 32(1)(a), after the word “information”, there shall be inserted the words “or a report from the Board under regulation 22A(2)”.

12.  In regulation 33(a), after the word “information”, there shall be inserted the words “or a report from the Board under regulation 22A(2)”.

13.  In Schedule 2—

(a) the words from “PART 1” to “Forms 2 to 16”, immediately after the heading to the Schedule, shall be omitted;

(b) after Form 1 there shall be inserted the form contained in the Schedule to these Regulations.

14.  In Schedule 2, in Form 1, paragraph 5b), the following words shall be inserted before the word “and”—

“in a previous application for legal aid in this case”.

15.  In Schedule 2, in Form 5, sub-paragraph 2 of paragraph 3, for—

“Children 18 and over

□

Children 16 and 17

□

Children 11 to 15

□

Children under 11

□”,

there shall be substituted the following—

“Children under 19	□	Date of birth for each child	▭	Children and other Relatives 19 and over	□
Other relatives under 19	□	Date of birth for each relative	▭”.

16.  In Schedule 2, Part Two of Form 6 (which deals with Calculation of contribution from INCOME) shall be amended by substituting for “£49”, “£50” and, for “£50”, “£51”.

17.  In Schedule 3, after paragraph 2A, there shall be inserted the following—

“2B.   Where section 44A of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968 (death of convicted person) applies—

(a) if the applicant is the personal representative of the dead person, the financial resources to be taken into account shall be those forming part of the estate of the dead person, and not the resources belonging to the applicant in another capacity or to any other person;

(b) otherwise, the financial resources to be taken into account shall be those belonging to the applicant or treated as belonging to him in accordance with the other provisions of this Schedule.”.

18.  In Schedule 3—

(a) in paragraph 10(1)(b)(ii), after the first occurrence of the word “relative”, there shall be inserted the words “aged 18 or under”.

(b) At the end of paragraph 10(1)(b)(ii), there shall be inserted the following—

“(iii) in the case of a dependent child or a dependent relative aged 19 or over, at the rate equivalent to the amount which would have been specified in accordance with paragraph 10(1)(b)(ii) immediately before he attained the age of 19.”.

19.  After paragraph 15 of Schedule 3, there shall be inserted the following—

“15A.   A resource of a capital nature shall not be treated as not belonging to the person concerned by reason only that that person is restrained from using or disposing of it by the order of any court, unless—

(a) that person has requested the court which made the order to release assets forming all or part of that resource for use in connection with the proceedings to which the legal aid application relates; and

(b) that request has been refused.”.

20.  Schedule 4 shall be amended by substituting, for “£49”, “£50” and, for “£50”, “£51”.

Irvine of Lairg, C.

Dated 4th March 1998

We consent,

John McFall

Graham Allen

Two of the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Treasury

Dated 10th March 1998