Free Legal Assistance in the Czech Republic - the Current Situation and Prepared Legislation

In the Czech Republic, there is an absence of a law which would globally set up providing of free legal aid for people in need. Several rules of law affect these questions, but it is not possible to take such regulations as sufficient, particularly with regard to obligations arising from the international conventions. After several years of the absence of the needed legal regulations, the Ministry of Justice presented the draft of a new Free Legal Aid act in the spring 2009.
The new legislation should remove the most serious shortcomings of the current legal aid system as the insufficient definitions of the conditions for obtaining legal aid, the fragmentation of legal aid system or his unclear funding. The new law should clearly define the legal aid providers or point out who will decide about applications.