For civil cases, in considering whether a case should
be assigned out, consideration is given to the following circumstances:
| (a)
|
whether
the aided person has nominated a private practitioner
to act for him; |
| (b)
|
whether
parties to proceedings are both legally aided, if so,
one of the parties must be represented by a private lawyer
in accordance with Section 12 of the Legal Aid Ordinance;
|
| (c) |
whether
a conflict of interest arises or is likely to arise, e.g.
an action against the Legal Aid Department; |
| (d) |
whether
before legal aid is applied for or granted, aided person
is already represented by private practitioner; |
| (e) |
whether the case is connected to other cases which have
been assigned out, e.g. employee's compensation and Common
Law cases. If so, the case will be assigned to the same
private practitioner; |
| (f)
|
whether
the capacity and workload of the Litigation Division permits
new cases to be taken up; and |
| (g) |
whether
expertise to handle the case is available in-house. |
In
criminal cases, in respect of District Court cases, all cases
are assigned out for conduct of trial. In the Court of First
Instance and appeal cases, staff lawyers of the Department
act as instructing solicitors except in cases where it is
desirable in the interests of justice to provide separate
representations to the aided persons in the case.
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