# National Security Act 2023, Paragraph 10: Appointment of special advocate

Extent: E+W+S+N.I.

(1) The appropriate law officer may appoint a person to represent the interests of a party in any relevant proceedings or appeal proceedings from which the party (and any legal representative of the party) is excluded.
(2) A person appointed under sub-paragraph (1) is referred to in this Schedule as appointed as a “special advocate”.
(3) The “appropriate law officer” is—
(a) in relation to proceedings in England and Wales, the Attorney General;
(b) in relation to proceedings in Scotland, the Advocate General for Scotland;
(c) in relation to proceedings in Northern Ireland, the Advocate General for Northern Ireland.
(4) A person appointed as a special advocate is not responsible to the party to the proceedings whose interests the person is appointed to represent.
(5) A person may be appointed as a special advocate only if—
(a) in the case of an appointment by the Attorney General, the person has a general qualification for the purposes of section 71 of the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990;
(b) in the case of an appointment by the Advocate General for Scotland, the person is an advocate or a solicitor who has rights of audience in the Court of Session or the High Court of Justiciary by virtue of section 25A of the Solicitors (Scotland) Act 1980;
(c) in the case of an appointment by the Advocate General for Northern Ireland, the person is a member of the Bar of Northern Ireland.

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Source: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/32/schedule/10/paragraph/10 (the official version)
Page: https://openlegislation.uk/national-security-act-2023/schedule-10/paragraph-10
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives.