The Gazette 1972

qualification itself substantially modified and improv-

ed". (Para. 85.)

Emphasis is thus on the need to integrate academic

uud professional training, drawing on medicine as the

model. Whether or not one agrees with the medical

model (as to which see

infra),

no-one surely could

quarrel with the declaration that the traditional antithesis

between "academic and vocational", "theoretical and

practical", which has divided the universities from the

professions in the past, must be eliminated by adjustment

on both sides. There is, though, room to doubt whether

such distinctions have any validity. Nor should any

reasonable person disagree with the Committee's criti-

cisms of the present system, involving, as it does, "dup-

lication and overlaps leading to the poor utilisation of

scarce resources, particularly accommodation, library

provisions, and perhaps, most crucial of all — suitable

teaching staff". (Para. 85.) Somewhat similarly the Irish

Minister for Justice, Mr. D. O'Malley, after castigating

legal education in Ireland (both for solicitors and barris-

ters) for being "outdated and unsatisfactory", is re-

Ported as having said, "The present confused system is,

to say the least, illogical and wasteful of resources".

( (1971) 65 The Gazette of the I.L.S.I.135.)

Two pre-qualification stages

It will be seen that the Committee argues both on

educational and on economic and pragmatic grounds

tor integration. The basic outline of the scheme pro-

posed for the future, as given in para. 100, indicates

these stages in the legal educational process: (1)

the

academic stage,

to be taken at a university or its equiv-

alent; (2)

the professional stage,

comprising (a) organ-

ised vocational training in an institutional setting and

(o) practical training in a professional setting under

supervision ("in-training"), an (improved) pupillage

system being retained for the Bar, but the articles system

for solicitors to be replaced by a period of three years

limited practice after qualification. (There is also a

Projected third (post-qualification) stage of continuing

education and training, considered by the Committee to

offer by far the best prospects of "growth" in legal

education. Paras. 170-177, which discuss this stage,

were criticised by a speaker at a recent symposium on

theOrmrod Report as a "jumble of postscripts".)

There may perhaps be detected a certain confusion

°f ideas and ideals in the elaboration of the two pre-

qualification stages, for what is suggested does not

appear to achieve the desired integration of academic

and professional training. Rather does it keep the pre-

qualification stages in separate compartments. The

university law schools will continue as before and will

remain masters of their own houses (subject to certain

limitations considered

infra),

provided that the courses

mclude the "basic core subjects" as listed by the report,

Constitutional Law, Law of Contract, Law of Tort,

(including "some elementary instruction in

rusts") and Criminal Law. The vocational courses will

?? provided either "within the university and college

nigher education structure" (if the majority has its way)

7 the profession in its own schools (if the minority

"as its way). (Paras. 140,143.) But no matter where the

National training is provided, the training itself must

ipso facto

be different in every way from that provided

by the existing faculties of law and inevitably it will be

organised and institutionalised in a completely different

way. This is implicit in the Committee's statement of

the factors which must govern the provision of the

courses. Thus the professional bodies are to have a

powerful influence over the courses and a large number

of specially qualified teachers will have to be found.

(Paras. 138, 139.) Further, only four or five centres are

envisaged, so that the vast majority of university and

college law schools will be completely unaffected.

Integration or Rationalisation?

Is this "integration into a coherent whole"? Timely

rationalization it certainly may be, but it is doubtful if it

is integration in the most commonly accepted sense of

that term, which would call for a blending "into a

coherent whole" of the two pre-qualification stages.

All that is proposed by way of integration is that a law

degree should be recognised

per se

as part of the qualifi-

cation for practice and not merely as an entitlement to

exemption from some of the professional examinations.

(Para. 106.) (It may be noted that "law degree" is care-

fully defined in para. 110 and includes a degree in law

obtained after a three-year course of full-time study at

a university in Northern Ireland, but in the case of the

Republic of Ireland only a degree in law obtained at a

university "which has been approved for the purpose".)

This is not exactly a revolutionary proposal. As the

Report itself states, the "practising Bar . . . is now be-

coming almost a profession of law graduates; the

solicitors' branch is clearly developing in the same

direction". (Para. 35.)

The law faculties and departments are in any event

to be regarded as "an essential part of the training

apparatus of the profession". But the real issue of

greater integration of academic education and vocational

training is to a large extent avoided, perhaps because it

was considered impracticable to realise—but this is no-

where stated. There is reference to "the desire of the

law faculties to teach law as a broad and liberal edu-

cation with only the vocational bias inherent in a pro-

fessional subject, and to retain the maximum freedom

to change their curricula and to experiment". The

faculties also stressed to the Committee the large part

which they played in the education of those law students

who did not intend to enter the profession. The Com-

mittee did not wish in any way to alter the existing

situation "or to subject academic teaching to narrow

vocational requirements", but at the same time it quotes

(in para. 106) from the Robbins Report (on Higher

Education) (1963) which mildly chided universities for

their reluctance to undertake the imparting af practical

techniques and emphasised there was no betrayal of

values when institutions of higher education taught what

would be of some practical use, provided that the teach-

ing was such "as to promote the general powers of the

mind". As may be seen, even this gentle reminder is

hedged about with apologia from the Committee.

Integration in Australasia

However "academic" 'a law degree course may be,

it is unlikely that there is not a great deal of it which is