What Your Levy is For

The Legal Services Regulatory Authority collects a levy on an annual basis from:

• the Law Society of Ireland, which pays a collective levy on behalf of practising solicitors;
• the Bar of Ireland, which pays a collective levy on behalf of its members; and
• practising barristers who are not members of the Law Library, who pay the levy on an individual basis.

Legal practitioners who are in the full-time service of the State are exempt from paying the levy.

The levy amount is determined each year by the LSRA with the consent of the Minister for Justice. The amount is calculated in accordance with the provisions of Part 7 of the Legal Services Regulation Act 2015 Act, as amended (2015 Act).

The levy provisions of the 2015 Act were amended by the Courts and Civil Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2023 (2023 Act) which is available here.

The key amendments in relation to the levy include that:

• the levy now includes an amount in relation to budgeted expenditure.
• there is now a statutory definition of being in the full-time service of the State.

Amendments were also introduced in relation to the Roll of Practising Barristers (Roll) which are relevant for the operation of the levy. These introduce new obligations for barristers to:

• update the LSRA with a change to your details, including your name, your postal/email address, whether you are in the full-time service of the State and whether or not you are a member of the Law Library. A failure to update the LSRA could constitute misconduct under the 2015 Act;
• apply to the LSRA to have your name removed from the Roll where you no longer wish to provide legal services.

For more information on changes to the Roll introduced by the Courts and Civil Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2023, please see the Roll of Practising Barristers web page.

The LSRA issues levy assessment notices each year. The 2023 levy assessment notices will be issued in October/November for the 2022 levy year. From 2024 onwards, it is anticipated that the levy assessment notices will be issued in April/May.

The levy is collected by the LSRA to meet:

• the expenses of the Authority and the Legal Practitioner’s Disciplinary Tribunal (Disciplinary Tribunal) incurred in the performance by them of their functions under the 2015 Act, and
• the repayments by the Authority of any advances made by the Minister under section 32 of the 2015 Act.

The Disciplinary Tribunal is an independent body which hears inquiries of alleged misconduct against solicitors and barristers that are referred to it by the LSRA’s Complaints Committee and the Law Society of Ireland. You can find more information about the Disciplinary Tribunal here.

The key changes introduced by the 2023 Act relate to how the LSRA calculates the annual levy. Originally, the levy calculation was based on recouping the previous year’s expenditure. This limited the amount of money the LSRA could generate with the levy and did not take account of the regulator’s additional funding needs as its functions expanded.

Under the 2023 Act, prospective budgeted net expenditure for the Authority and the Disciplinary Tribunal can now be included as part of the LSRA’s levy calculations.

For further details of other changes to the levy calculation, the 2023 Act is available here.

If you are a barrister who was not a member of the Law Library, and if the exemption under section 97 of the 2015 Act did not apply to you, you will receive a levy assessment notice directly in 2023 (for the 2022 levy year) if your details were:

• on the Roll on 31 December 2022, or
• on the Roll in 2022 but were removed prior to 31 December 2022 except for when such removal was done (i) on the request of the person concerned where he or she acquired a solicitor’s practising certificate or (ii) on the death of that person.

Levy assessment notices will be issued to the Law Society of Ireland and the Bar of Ireland in 2023 for the 2022 levy year. The Law Society of Ireland and the Bar of Ireland pay a collective levy on behalf of their members.

Yes. The levy calculation includes complex apportionment criteria. These include, for example:

• the number of complaints against particular types of legal practitioners (solicitors, barristers who are members of the Law Library or barristers who are not members of the Law Library) and
• the number of applications for inquiry to the LPDT in respect of particular types of legal practitioners.

Yes. The levy provisions were amended by the 2023 Act to authorise budgeted net expenditure to be factored into the calculation of the levy for 2022 and subsequent years. This new way of calculating the levy means the amount you will be required to pay will increase to reflect the expanded operations of the LSRA and the establishment and operation of the Disciplinary Tribunal.

In the case of non-payment by both individuals and the professional bodies, the LSRA may recover the amount outstanding as a simple contract debt in any court of competent jurisdiction.

For barristers who are not members of the Law Library, if you do not pay all or part of the levy within one month of the payable date, you will receive a further notice from the LSRA.

This will include a copy of the original levy assessment and a notification of the rate of interest that will apply in the case of ongoing non-payment.

If, after three months from the payable date for the levy, it is still not paid in full, then you will be removed from the Roll.

In order to provide legal services in the State, a practising barrister must be on the Roll. Under section 136 of the 2015 Act it is a criminal offence to provide legal services without being on the Roll.

A further change introduced by the 2023 Act is that where a barrister is removed from the Roll for non-payment of the levy and that barrister subsequently applies to have their details entered on the Roll, the LSRA will not comply with that request until such time as any amount payable by the person, together with interest, is paid in full.