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• Bar Council to continue to voice views on current issues
• Bar Council explains what influences its statements

©The Sun (Used by permission)
by Tan Yi Liang

KUALA LUMPUR: The Bar Council has begun talks with the government to fund its legal aid programme which last year handled 18,000 cases for which legal fees waived amounted to RM100 million.

Bar Council president Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan said the council was in the midst of talks with de facto Law Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz for a plan to facilitate government funding and cooperation between the council’s Legal Aid Scheme and the government-run Legal Aid Bureau.

“Datuk Seri Nazri has been very supportive of the idea (and indicated) it is something that he will support when we raised the issue with him about a month ago,” she said, adding that the council would soon come up with a concept paper for the funding.

At present, its legal aid funding of about RM1.2 million comes from an annual deduction of RM100 from the subscription fee of lawyers nationwide.

Sreenevasan said the funding allows the legal aid service, provided by over 700 lawyers, to contribute about RM100 million in legal fees nationwide and clear more than 18,000 cases last year.

“We would like a situation where some of lawyers’ costs are covered – we will get more volunteers that way. We want to get volunteers interested in the work and we want to provide a quality legal aid service.”

She said that while the government has its own legal aid scheme, the work performed is limited.

“They don’t do criminal work except for mitigation, so when they see a conflict situation, they don’t do that work. So all that work lands with the Bar Council Legal Aid Scheme, and we are finding it difficult to cope,” Sreenevasan said, adding that it is the responsibility of the government to provide legal aid.

“We think it is the government’s duty to provide legal aid. What we are doing is on a voluntary basis and it is something we are happy to do. But ultimately the burden and responsibility of providing access to justice lies with the government.”

“What we want to see is a scheme where the government works with us – the lawyers – where we provide the lawyers and the legal expertise, and they help to fund the scheme,” she said after the launch of the Legal Aid Centre website and room at the Duta Court Complex here.

Sreenevasan dismissed a statement by Malaysian Muslim Lawyers Association president Tan Sri Abu Zahar Ujang calling on the council to disband if it wished to “dabble in politics”.

“Name one statement we have made that is in relation to anything but justice and the rule of law. We are very clear that we cover those sort of issues. People can label it what they want and there is nothing we can do about it,” she said, adding that it is the role of lawyers to “educate and inform” the public of their legal rights.

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