Legal Aid NSW is responsible for providing legal assistance to disadvantaged people across New South Wales. In criminal law matters, this includes legal information, legal advice, duty lawyer services and grants of legal aid for ongoing representation. Legal Aid NSW delivers services through a combination of in-house lawyers and private practitioners.

Demand for legal assistance is high and increasing, while resources and service capacity are limited. Legal Aid NSW is therefore required to make decisions about how services are prioritised and delivered.

Access also depends on the availability of legal practitioners across different locations and stages of the criminal justice system.

This audit will assess whether Legal Aid NSW provides timely and equitable access to legal assistance and representation in criminal law matters, and whether it prioritises and delivers these services efficiently within available resources.

The audit team will address the audit objective with the following criteria:

You can share feedback with the Audit Office if you have experience or views relevant to this audit. You can do this anonymously if you wish. Submissions close at 5 pm Friday 30 October 2026.

You can contribute to this audit through the "Contribute to this audit" button in the left-hand menu, the comment icon at the top right on mobile, or through this link.

Submissions can cover access to legal information, advice, duty lawyer services, grants of legal aid, representation in criminal law matters, service quality, barriers to help, or how access to criminal legal assistance could be improved.

We welcome feedback from people who sought help, family members and carers, community organisations, advocacy groups and others with experience of the criminal legal assistance system:

• your experience seeking legal information, advice or representation
• any delays, gaps or barriers you experienced
• experiences in regional, rural or remote areas, in custody, or as a member of a disadvantaged or priority group
• how access to, or lack of, legal assistance affected you, your family or your community.

We may use your feedback to identify key themes, risks or issues that could be examined further during the audit. We may also include short extracts from submissions in our audit report, where appropriate. If we do this, we will not identify the person or organisation that provided the feedback.

We will not publish submissions on our website or include information that identifies you without your consent.

In some circumstances, the Audit Office has reporting obligations for matters involving wrongdoing in the public sector that come to our attention.

However, please note:

• We will not examine individual legal matters or investigate every issue or concern raised. In general, the audit team will look for supporting evidence from other sources, such as documents, data and audit interviews. See contact details below for organisations that may be able to assist with individual matters.
• We will consider all feedback, but we may not contact you to discuss your submission.
• We cannot answer questions or provide information collected during the audit.
• Performance audits assess whether public money is used efficiently, effectively, economically and in compliance with the law. They do not question the merits of government policy objectives. Please visit the Performance Audit Guide for audited entities, including non-public sector entities, for more information on how we undertake performance audits.

The Audit Office is required by section 38 of the Government Sector Audit Act to keep information obtained during an audit confidential. The Audit Office takes this responsibility seriously.

Information the Audit Office receives, and working papers it creates during an audit, are classed as excluded information under Schedule 2 of the Government Information (Public Access) Act 2009 (GIPA Act). This means an access application under the GIPA Act cannot be made for that information. 

Click here for more information on our confidentiality and reporting obligations for submissions received via our website.

Different issues may need to be directed to different organisations. If you have questions or concerns about an individual legal aid matter, legal aid application, legal representation, lawyer or complaint pathway, you may wish to contact:

• Legal Aid NSW online Contact us or by calling 1300 888 529
• the Office of the Legal Services Commissioner to make a complaint online or on 1800 242 958
• the Law Society of NSW online or on 02 9926 0333
• the NSW Bar Association online or on 02 9232 4055
• the NSW Ombudsman to make a complaint online NSW Ombudsman | How to make a complaint or on 1800 451 524.

The Audit Office cannot resolve complaints, review legal advice, reconsider legal aid decisions or intervene in court proceedings.