The Legal Aid in Contempt of Court Proceedings (Scotland) (Fees) Amendment Regulations 1997

Statutory Instruments

1997 No. 718 (S.61)

LEGAL AID AND ADVICE, SCOTLAND

The Legal Aid in Contempt of Court Proceedings (Scotland) (Fees) Amendment Regulations 1997

Made

7th March 1997

Laid before Parliament

11th March 1997

Coming into force

1st April 1997

The Secretary of State, in exercise of the powers conferred on him by sections 33(2)(a) and (3)(b) and (f) of the Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 1986(1) and of all other powers enabling him in that behalf, hereby makes the following Regulations:

Citation, commencement and interpretation

1.—(1) These Regulations may be cited as the Legal Aid in Contempt of Court Proceedings (Scotland) (Fees) Amendment Regulations 1997 and shall come into force on 1st April 1997.

(2) In these Regulations–

“the Act” means the Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 1986;

“the principal Regulations” means the Legal Aid in Contempt of Court Proceedings (Scotland) (Fees) Regulations 1992(2).

Application

2.  These Regulations shall apply only to fees for work done on or after 1st April 1997.

Amendment of the principal Regulations

3.  For paragraphs 5 and 6 of Schedule 1 to the principal Regulations (table of fees allowable to solicitors for legal aid made available under section 30 of the Act in connection with proceedings for contempt of court) there shall be substituted the following paragraphs:–

“5.   Where a document is copied and it is necessary to take a copy of more than 20 sheets (whether 20 of 1 sheet, 5 of 4 sheets or whatever), a fee of 8 pence shall be paid for each sheet copied.

Interpretation

6.   In this Table–

• a “sheet” shall consist of 250 words or numbers; and

• a “page” shall consist of 125 words or numbers.”.

James Douglas-Hamilton

Minister of State, Scottish Office

St Andrew’s House,

Edinburgh

7th March 1997

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the Legal Aid in Contempt of Court Proceedings (Scotland) (Fees) Regulations 1992 (“the principal Regulations”).

The Regulations substitute new paragraphs 5 and 6 in Schedule 1 to the principal Regulations so as to reduce the fees allowed to solicitors for copying for legal aid in connection with proceedings for contempt of court. The Regulations also simplify the drafting of these paragraphs.

The new paragraphs provide that where a document is copied and it is necessary to take a copy of more than 20 sheets a fee of 8 pence shall be paid for each sheet copied (regulation 3). The previous paragraphs provided that a fee of 35 pence would be paid for each sheet where an exceptional amount of copying proved necessary (exceptional being defined as meaning the production of more than 20 output copy sheets when a document has been copied).

By virtue of regulation 2 the Regulations only apply to fees for work done on or after 1st April 1997.

(1)

1986 c. 47.

(2)

S.I. 1992/1228, as amended by S.I. 1993/529 and 1994/1018.