1. The Appeal Committee of the Court of Final Appeal dismissed the application by the Secretary for Justice for leave to appeal from the decision of the Court of Appeal in this matter concerning the admission to the Hong Kong Bar of Mr Timothy Owen KC to represent Mr Lai Chee Ying in his trial on charges of conspiracy in relation to seditious publications and conspiracy to collude with a foreign country or external elements to endanger national security. 2. The Secretary for Justice had, together with the Bar Council, opposed the application for the admission of Mr Owen KC to represent Mr Lai. The Chief Judge of the High Court, sitting as a judge of first instance, had exercised his discretion in favour of Mr Owen KC’s admission, applying long-standing principles based on the public interest. 3. The Secretary for Justice, but not the Bar Council, appealed to the Court of Appeal, essentially challenging the weight attributed to relevant aspects of the public interest involved in the Chief Judge’s exercise of discretion. The Court of Appeal dismissed that appeal, concluding there was no valid basis to interfere with the Chief Judge’s exercise of discretion and confirming the admission of Mr Owen KC. 4. The Secretary for Justice then applied to the Court of Appeal for leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal. At that stage, the Secretary for Justice advanced a fundamentally different case seeking to challenge the established principles for admissions of overseas counsel for a specific case and contending instead for a blanket ban on such admissions in cases involving national security, subject only to undefined exceptional circumstances. The Court of Appeal refused to grant leave to appeal on this new argument. 5. The Secretary for Justice renewed his application for leave to appeal to the Appeal Committee of the Court of Final Appeal. 6. In dismissing the application, the Appeal Committee applied the Court’s well-established principle that a new point will not be permitted to be raised on appeal where it bears on fairness to the other party and on the Court’s ability properly to adjudicate on the matter. In the present case, both these considerations weighed against the grant of leave to appeal since the Secretary for Justice was seeking to raise radically new points which, notwithstanding their obvious importance, had not been mentioned or explored either before the Chief Judge or the Court of Appeal. The Appeal Committee held that the Secretary for Justice had not made out a proper case for the grant of leave to appeal and so dismissed the application. 7. Since the application was dismissed on the basis of the principle governing the raising of new points, it was not necessary for the Appeal Committee to enter into any discussion of the Court of Appeal’s views of the merits of the Secretary for Justice’s underlying arguments, which were in any event entirely case-specific and not binding on subsequent cases. 8. The Appeal Committee noted that the courts of the HKSAR were fully committed to safeguarding national security and to acting effectively to prevent, suppress and impose punishment for any act or activity endangering national security as required by Article 3 of the National Security Law. That duty would be carried out whenever national security issues were properly raised and duly explored, enabling the courts to undertake a proper adjudication of those issues. Thus, in relation to admissions of overseas counsel for a specific case, where national security considerations properly arose, such considerations were plainly of the highest importance to be taken into account. In the present case, however, the Secretary for Justice had fundamentally changed his case only at the stage of seeking leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal, had raised undefined and unsubstantiated issues said to involve national security which were not mentioned or explored in the courts below, and no appropriate basis had been made out for the grant of leave to appeal.