Over 1,600 asylum-seekers and 1,300 people seeking divorce were granted legal aid by the Legal Aid Board last year, according to its annual report for 1999.
The total number of people who received legal aid from the board that year was 14,400.
The majority of these - about 97 per cent of court cases and 90 per cent of legal advice cases - were in the family law area.
The refugee legal service is a separate division of the Legal Aid Board. It initially had a staff of 31, but this has steadily increased and will reach 140 next year.
The board also reported a continuing fall in the number of people on waiting lists for first interviews with solicitors.
This stood at over 4,200 at the end of 1998 and had fallen to under 3,000 by the end of 1999. It now stands at just over 2,000, according to the board's chief executive, Mr Frank Goodman.
He also told The Irish Times the number of asylum-seekers receiving legal aid this year to date was 3,300.
An increase in resources also contributed to the cutting of waiting lists. The grant-in-aid to the board was increased by 25 per cent in 1999, from £9.6 million in 1998 to almost £12 million last year.
However, the board is finding it difficult to recruit and retain staff, Mr Goodman acknowledged. In 1998, 70 staff left, and in 1999 this figure had increased to 85.
"This very substantial level of turnover, in an organisation comprising almost 300 staff, has caused particular disruption in Dublin law centres where the board currently has eight vacant solicitor posts out of a total complement in the city law centres of 35 posts," he said.