Legal Aid South Africa Act, 2014 (Act No. 39 of 2014)Chapter 4 : Support Structure of Legal Aid South Africa20. Recovery of costs by Legal Aid South Africa |
| (1) | Whenever in any judicial proceedings or any dispute in respect of which legal aid is rendered to a litigant or other person by Legal Aid South Africa, costs become payable to that litigant or other person in terms of a judgment of the court or a settlement or otherwise, it is, subject to the powers of the Board referred to in section 4 with regard to the fixing of conditions, deemed that the litigant or other person has ceded his or her rights to those costs to Legal Aid South Africa. |
| (2) | A litigant or person referred to in subsection (1) or his or her legal representative or Legal Aid South Africa must, at any time before payment of the costs deemed in terms of subsection (1) to be ceded to Legal Aid South Africa, whether before or after those costs become payable, give the person by whom the costs are to be paid at his or her last known address and the registrar or clerk of the court concerned notice in writing that legal aid is being or has been rendered, and Legal Aid South Africa may proceed in its own name to have those costs taxed and to recover them, without being substituted on the record of the judicial proceedings concerned, if any, for the litigant in question. |
| (3) | The costs referred to in subsection (1) must be calculated and the bill of costs concerned, if any, must be taxed or agreed as if the litigant or person to whom legal aid was rendered, had obtained the services of the legal representative acting on his or her behalf in the proceedings or dispute concerned, without the aid of Legal Aid South Africa. |