KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 20 — Candidates sitting the Certificate in Legal Practice (CLP) examination are assessed purely on merit, with no quota imposed on the number of passes, the Dewan Rakyat was told today.
Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform) M. Kulasegaran said candidates were assessed based on their performance, with a minimum passing mark set for each subject.
“The passing mark for each CLP subject is 40, and there is no quota for passes. Candidates are assessed purely on merit,” he said during the question-and-answer session.
He was responding to a supplementary question from Dr V. Sivakumar (PH-Batu Gajah) on measures to address the low CLP examination pass rate while maintaining professional standards, after only 19 per cent of candidates (158 out of 826) obtained a full pass in 2026, compared with 21 per cent in 2025.
Kulasegaran clarified that the statistics covered only the main 2026 CLP examination and did not include the results of the supplementary examination.
“The overall results of the 2026 CLP examination will be announced in November 2026, after the results of the supplementary examination have been obtained and approved by the Board,” he said.
On the factors contributing to candidates’ failure, Kulasegaran said most candidates were law graduates from the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand, where they had studied the common law system, but appeared not to have adequately prepared for the Malaysian law component of the CLP examination.
He said that candidates also had difficulty identifying legal issues in examination questions, applying the law to the facts and citing relevant case law to support their answers.
In response to Sivakumar’s original question on the CLP’s structure, assessment methods, duration of study and transition to the New Bar Course (NBC), Kulasegaran said the Legal Profession Qualifying Board had established an NBC Task Force on April 27.
He said the task force was tasked with conducting a study to develop an implementation framework for the NBC, including arrangements to ensure a smooth transition to the new professional legal qualification system.
Kulasegaran said the NBC, which would replace the CLP, comprises two programmes, namely the Conversion Course (CC) and the Legal Practice Postgraduate Certificate (LPPC), with a greater emphasis on practical legal skills and professional competence.
He said the existing CLP system assesses candidates solely through written examinations, without a comprehensive evaluation of their practical legal skills, and does not require them to complete preparatory courses before sitting the examinations.
On the transition from the CLP to the NBC, he explained that the NBC Task Force was reviewing policies concerning candidates who had yet to pass the existing examinations but still had remaining attempts and valid registration periods.
“The qualifying board will consider this matter once the NBC Task Force has completed its study on the transition mechanism,” he said.
Responding to a supplementary question from Datuk Che Mohamad Zulkifly Jusoh (PN-Besut) on checks and balances in setting the curriculum and assessing prospective lawyers, Kulasegaran said the professional legal qualification system would continue under an improved approach with a revised set of courses.
He said that the improvements took into account complaints about the previous system while emphasising the difference between academic legal studies and the professional training required to become a lawyer.
Kulasegaran explained that law programmes in the United Kingdom and several other countries typically take three years to complete, compared with four years at local universities, where a professional component is introduced in the fourth year. — Bernama