New South Wales Consolidated Acts

LEGAL AID COMMISSION ACT 1979 - SECT 51

51 Application for appointment to panel

(1) A legal practitioner in private practice may apply to the Commission for appointment to one or more panels.

(2) The Commission is to establish a selection committee under this Act, comprising a nominee of the Law Society, a nominee of the Bar Association and such other persons as may be appointed by the Commission.

(3) All matters relating to the membership and procedure of a selection committee are to be determined by the Commission after consultation with the Law Society and the Bar Association.

(4) An application is to be assessed by the selection committee which, after its assessment is made, is to recommend to the Commission whether, in its opinion, the applicant is a suitable person to be appointed to the panel or panels for which the person has applied.

(5) The Commission may not:

(a) refuse to appoint a legal practitioner to a panel for which the legal practitioner has made application, or

(b) suspend or remove a legal practitioner from a panel, otherwise than at the legal practitioner’s request,

unless the Commission has given written notice to the legal practitioner of its reasons and has given the legal practitioner a reasonable opportunity to be heard in relation to the proposed refusal or removal.

(6) If, as a consequence of disciplinary proceedings taken against a legal practitioner, the legal practitioner is prevented from practising as a legal practitioner, the legal practitioner, if he or she is a member of a panel, is taken to have been removed from the panel.