THE GOVERNMENT owes lawyers providing legal aid services millions of dollars. Last year it was reported that the Legal Aid Council owed lawyers some $43 million dollars. Against outstanding debts for the current fiscal year the council has recently paid out $16.3 million for the months of April to August 2005. A backlog of millions remains to be cleared.
Legal aid services were introduced in the 1970s to assist persons with legal counsel whose own resources would not permit retaining an attorney. The state assumed obligation to pay at least part of the cost of legal defence for such persons. This was all done in the interest of justice being served.
The fees never could match those made by attorneys in private practice. Many lawyers generously gave of their time to help make the service work. And to be kept waiting for inordinately long periods stretching into years after service has been provided is unconscionable. Many attorneys, out of frustration, have withdrawn from providing legal aid services. Just over 290 are now in the system facing the frustration of being owed for long periods.
Legal aid is just one of too many areas in which the Government is deadbeat. Several state agencies have had to face the embarrassment of not being able to pay their utility bills on time, not because of poor budgeting, but because the Ministry of Finance fails to release allocated funds on time. The police and health services, in recent times, have chalked up billions of dollars of debt between them to their suppliers. Schools have not being exempt. And, like the health services, face the double jeopardy of being told to collect fees as part of their operational income but no patient or student can be turned away for failing to pay. The inevitable shortfalls from such a contradictory procedure are not made up with any expeditiousness, if at all, by the Government.
The Government, it is true, is deeply indebted and cash flow from tax revenue does not always match expectations. But this cannot simply be used to shrug off the contractual obligations which a debtor has to creditors who have already provided goods and services and must be paid. Last year a mere $57 million was allocated to legal aid, up from $45 million the year before. It is remarkable how substantially larger amounts can be quickly mobilised for special pet projects which have not even been budgeted for.
At today's dollar value, $57 million is a mere pittance for such an important aspect of the justice system and to keep providers of legal aid services waiting for unduly long periods for payment is further adding insult to injury. Government has no more basic function than the dispensing of justice. And if legal aid is a vital part of the system, as Attorney-General A. J. Nicholson would insist, then let its relatively small financial needs be met and the providers of service to the Legal Aid Council be promptly paid their fees which are already subsidised by goodwill.
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