Allan Kiritapu; O'Connor GregLEGAL SERVICES AMENDMENT BILLSecond ReadingHon KIRITAPU ALLAN (Minister of Justice): I seek leave to present a legislative statement on the Legal Services Amendment Bill. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Leave is sought for that motion. Are there any objections? There are no objections.Matt Doocey: Point of order. Sorry I'm just seeking clarification: seeking leave for—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Tabling a legislative statement.Matt Doocey: Yeah. Why are we seeking leave?ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): I believe it was because it was not presented by the time it was supposed to earlier on this morning which was 11 a.m. No objections? Go on Minister.Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: I move That the Legal Services Amendment Bill be now read a second time. Legal aid is an important service that the Government provides for people on the lowest incomes. It supports people who need legal services but cannot afford to pay it on their own. Unfortunately inflation and wage increases have resulted in many people—despite being on very low incomes—still earning too much money to qualify for legal aid. For those who do qualify the user charge and interest payments are a barrier—if not entirely prohibitive—to accessing legal aid. A higher proportion of people are required to pay back their debt. Also some lawyers are now not taking on legal aid work due to remuneration rates leading to a shortage of providers and a very stressful experience for applicants.Budget 2022 allocated funding to address these pressing issues by increasing eligibility and repayment thresholds removing the requirement to pay a user charge and interest on unpaid legal aid debt and increasing provider remuneration. The Legal Services Amendment Bill supports this package of work by removing references to the user charge and interest from the Legal Services Act. This will give enduring certainty to users of the legal aid system that they will not be faced with these unnecessary charges and make the legal aid scheme fairer. Before I discuss the bill in more detail I'd like to acknowledge and thank the Justice Committee and the chairperson Vanushi Walters for their thorough consideration of this bill. I would also really like to acknowledge those that took the time to submit and have their views expressed. I'm pleased that there have only been two minor and technical changes to the bill recommended by the select committee.The user charge—which was $50 prior to 1 January this year and is now zero—was charged to some people before legal services could begin and was designed to make people think carefully about whether or not to engage a lawyer. Not only do we know that people who are eligible for legal aid are on such low incomes that they are likely to be very sure of the decision to take on debt and pursue legal proceedings without needing to be prompted by a charge but this charge was actually prohibitive and stopping some people who needed to access justice from applying for legal aid in the first instance. I've said it before and I'll say it again: for people on low incomes being charged to access legal aid services can literally mean making a choice between putting food on the table or exercising their right to access justice. The user charge can also delay justice when people are required to pay it off in instalments and are unable to progress their case in the meantime.Finally legal aid lawyers may choose to waive the charge but then they just absorb the cost themselves instead of passing it on to their clients which isn't necessarily always tenable. I want to acknowledge those lawyers that frequently have put themselves in that position in the interests of justice. This is an inherently unfair process that is not achieving its intended outcome and instead causes stress for legal age recipients and it is a substantive administrative burden for lawyers. Interest on unpaid legal aid debt was charged at a rate of 5 percent per annum prior to 1 January this year and it is now zero. Charging interest on legal aid debt is unfair. It penalises people who need that support which is the exact opposite of what the legal aid scheme was intended to achieve.Charging interest can also trap people in debt because while other debts to Government are collected first the legal aid debt is left to continue to accumulate interest. A system that essentially punishes those on low incomes for exercising their right to access justice by charging interest on debt that they will struggle to pay down is a system that we do not consider is fair just or right.The cost to Government of removing interest on legal aid debt really is relatively small but it will make a substantive difference to those who will have that debt. As I mentioned earlier the wider package of work this bill sits within does more than remove the user charge and interest payments. We have of course increased the eligibility thresholds for legal age which means that more people will qualify for legal aid. We've also increased the repayment thresholds—which means people on the lowest of eligible incomes are no longer required to repay that debt—and we've raised the remuneration rates for private legal aid lawyers. These changes in all aim to reverse some of the erosion that has happened to the legal aid scheme to make it fairer equitable and more accessible though we know that our work here is not done.The legal aid scheme is a key way the Government provides access to justice for those who simply cannot afford it and more changes are required to update it. The submissions to the select committee highlighted that but I know that the changes in this bill will mean a great deal to the people who need that legal aid support. This is an opportunity to address a pressing need faced by many people and I'm proud to commend this bill to the House. DEPUTY SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website. The question is that the motion be agreed to.