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On 22 October 2020, the State Council General Office released the details regarding the pilot scheme that allows those who pass the special qualifying examination to deal with civil and commercial legal matters (including litigation and non-litigation matters) in the nine mainland cities of the Greater Bay Area (“GBA”). In relation to Hong Kong residents and solicitors, those who satisfy the following criteria will be eligible to sit the special examination:
The Ministry of Justice will be in charge of the implementation of the special examination supervising closely the Department of Justice of the Guangdong Province to handle the registration, preliminary screening for eligible candidates, as well as the training and the detailed administration of the examination.
Once qualified, the “GBA lawyers” will be required to join as members of the local lawyers’ associations as well as the All China Lawyers Association. They can be employed by the Mainland law firms or the partnership associations between Hong Kong/ Macao law firms and Mainland law firms in the nine Mainland cities in the GBA. They, however, cannot be employed by the representative offices of Hong Kong/Macao or foreign law firms in the Mainland.
Following the decision of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress in September 2023 to extend the Pilot Scheme for three more years from 5 October 2023 to 4 October 2026, the State Council published the detailed measures for the extended Pilot Scheme on 28 September 2023 (“New Pilot Measures”).
The New Pilot Measures set out the requirements in obtaining the licence to practise as a GBA lawyer. The major change is that the post qualification experience threshold has been lowered from 5 years to 3 years.
The fourth examination will be held on 29 June 2024 in Shenzhen and Zhuhai, Guangdong. For details, please click here (in Chinese only).
For details about this special examination, please refer to the following information (in Chinese only):
