Early Appropriate Guilty Pleas

On Monday 30 April 2018, a new legislative scheme for all indictable matters commenced, involving the abolition of committals as we know them and, for state charges, the introduction of statutory caps on discounts for the utilitarian benefit of a plea of guilty.

To assist practitioners, the Public Defenders have a paper explaining the scheme (Early Guilty Pleas: A New Ball Game). Defence practitioners are statutorily obliged to explain aspects of the scheme, both orally and in writing, to their clients. Four agencies (Public Defenders, Legal Aid NSW, the Law Society and the Aboriginal Legal Service) have jointly drafted a brief explanation to practitioners (EAGP s.72(2) Note to Practitioners) and model explanations for accused; (EAGP s.72(2) Explanation if caps apply and EAGP s.72(2) Explanation if no caps apply). The Chief Magistrate of the Local Court has updated the Local Court Practice Note for Committal Proceedings and the NSW Police Commissioner and the NSW DPP have agreed a protocol concerning their relationship and respective responsibilities pursuant to the new committal procedure (The DPP/Police Protocol). The Second Reading Speech of the Bill amending the relevant legislation is also attached.

All of these documents are available in The EAGP Scheme - Traps, Tactics and Ethics for Defence Lawyers (PDF, 414.7 KB), by Richard Wilson (March 2024) - Updated

Table of Common Charge Options

The Table of Common Charge Options (PDF, 1.3 MB) has now been updated and contains information about whether an offence is an index offence under the Crimes (High Risk Offenders) Act 2006 (CHROA) or a registrable offence under the Child Protection (Offenders Registration) Act 2000 (CPORA).

The table sets out hundreds of common charges across different categories including sexual, drug, theft, violence and public justice offences. It is in the form of a "ready reckoner" showing alternative offences, maximum penalties, standard non-parole periods, whether the offence is strictly indictable, Table 1, Table 2 or summary and, now, the status of the offence under CHROA and CPORA.

Further reading

Model Explanations to clients

Last updated:

08 Oct 2024