Two pieces of subsidiary legislation that seek to improve the legal-aid regime and increase access to legal aid will be tabled in the Legislative Council on December 21.

The Legal Aid (Assessment of Resources & Contributions) (Amendment) Regulation 2005 seeks to relax the Legal Aid Department's assessment criteria on an applicant's disposable financial resources by allowing more items to be deducted or disregarded from his income and capital.

The items that can be deducted or disregarded will be expanded to cover:

* maintenance payments;

* the amount to provide for the care of all his dependents when he is at work, irrespective of whether he is absent from home, whether the dependent is living with him and whether he is self-employed or in employment; and

* insurance monies that are required to meet his medical needs following an injury to which the legal aid claim relates.

The proposed measures enable more people to become financially eligible for legal aid, which will cost the department an estimated $8.59 million a year.

Also, the rate of contribution for a successful claimant under the Supplementary Legal Aid Scheme will be reduced to 10% from the present 12% of the damages received.

Currently, a legally aided person must contribute towards the proceedings' legal costs. The Director of Legal Aid is entitled to a first charge on any property recovered for the person from the proceedings to cover any amount the person has to pay.

If the Director agrees to defer enforcing the first charge, the person now pays 10% interest a year.

The Legal Aid (Charge on Property) (Rate of Interest) Regulation proposes adopting a formula to calculate an interest rate that will be lower than the commercial best-lending rate, which now stands at 7.75%, and will follow more closely the market movements.

The proposed measures follow a review of the legal-aid assessment criteria, and consultations with the Legal Aid Services Council, the LegCo Panel on Administration of Justice and Legal Services as well as legal professional bodies. The two regulations were gazetted today.