The Department of Justice said the 2022 GBA Legal Professional Examination was successfully held in Hong Kong, Shenzhen and Zhuhai today.

Secretary for Justice Teresa Cheng noted that through the examination, more Hong Kong legal practitioners familiar with the laws of both the city and the Greater Bay Area will be available to provide professional services for the development of the bay area.

It enables them to have in-depth participation in building up the rule of law in the bay area, thereby achieving a win-win outcome, she added.

Ms Cheng expressed gratitude to the central government and the Ministry of Justice for their full support for organising the GBA Exam and the setting up of the examination venue in Hong Kong, providing invaluable opportunities to its legal practitioners.

The GBA Exam, first held last year, is a liberalisation measure under the Agreement on Trade in Services to the Mainland & Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement.

After passing the examination and obtaining the relevant practice certificate, Hong Kong legal practitioners including solicitors and barristers with five years’ accumulated legal practice experience or above can provide legal services in the nine Mainland municipalities in the bay area on specified civil and commercial legal matters to which the Mainland laws apply, the department said.

These legal practitioners will also enjoy the same privileges and be under the same obligations as Mainland lawyers. In the aforesaid nine Mainland municipalities, they can be retained by Mainland law firms and partnership associations of Mainland law firms and Hong Kong or Macao law firms, and can also become partners of partnership law firms, it added.