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GAZETTE
FEBRUARY 1989
From the
)
As I write this, I have just returned
from the European Presidents'
Conference which is held each year
in Vienna. Almost 30 European
nations both Eastern and Western
and including almost every country
in the Soviet Block were
represented, as were all the
Scandinavian countries. There
were simultaneous translations in
English, German and French. Peter
Shanley,. S.C., represented the
Chairman of the Bar Council and
Colin Haddick, President of the
Northern Ireland Law Society was
also there.
There were short Submissions
from a number of countries setting
out recent developments in their
jurisdictions and, of course, the
contribution by Richard Gaskell,
President of the Law Society of
England and Wales was received
with particular interest in the light
of the three Green Papers which
the Lord Chancellor has issued
dealing with contingency fees, the
work and organisation of the Legal
Profession (which appears to point
to a de facto merger of the two
branches of the Legal Profession)
and the authorisation of Building
Societies to carry out convey-
ancing. The impression I obtained
from listening to Mr. Gaskell and in
subsequent conversations with
him is that whilst the views of the
Lord Chancellor are described as
the provisional views of the
Government, he does not believe
there will be many changes and
that legislation will be actually
introduced in Parliament by the
Autumn. No proposals have yet
been issued for Scotland or
Northern Ireland.
Whether any of these proposals
(other than the Building Societies
being
pe rmi t t ed
to
offer
conveyancing services, which is
already provided for in the
Buildings Societies Bill) wi ll
eventually percolate to this
jurisdiction only time can tell, but
it is a very interesting situation and
one that the Law Society is
watching very closely as no doubt
are our colleagues at the Bar. My
information is that whilst the
English Bar is in a state of shock
they will be vigorously opposing
the proposals.
On the conveyancing front there
was an interesting submission from
the Danish President relating to a
Financial Institution (similar I gather
to a Building Society) which had
set up a conveyancing service in
Denmark. Apparently conveyan-
cing was not restricted to lawyers
in that jurisdiction, as it has been
here, but in practice nobody else
carried out the work which is
responsible for one-third of the fees
of the Profession. When this
happened the Danish Lawyers
Assoc i a t i on commenced an
advertising campaign attacking this
Financial Institution, stating that
such an offer of conveyancing
services was unethical and lacking
in independence. It emphased the
independence of the legal
profession and how important it
was that anyone buying a house
(for most people the most
important capital transaction of
their
lives)
should
have
independent disinterested advice.
It seems that this campaign has
been so successful that any other
Financial Institution proposing to
get more involved in the property
sector has specifically stated that
they will not offer conveyancing
services.
If we are not successful in
objecting to Building Societies
being
pe rmi t t ed
to
o f f er
conveyancing services under the
Building Societies Bill then it may
be that some such campaign
advising the public of the dangers
of dealing with a Building Society,
which cannot, by its nature, offer
an independent disinterested ser-
vice, may become necessary in the
public interest and also to give
some reasonable protection to the
profession.
The International Bar Association
took the opportunity of this
meeting to hold a meeting of its
general Professional Programme
Committee which dealt with first,
Inter Professional or Mu l ti
Disciplinary Partnerships and
secondly the problem of disci-
plinary con t r ol of
lawyers
practising outside their home
territory. For the moment the only
countries that permit Mu l ti
Disciplinary Partnerships are the
Netherlands and Germany. There
are not many so far and it is not
clear what the problems are. It
must be remembered that amongst
the Lord Chancellor's proposals will
be provision for International Legal
Partnerships and Multi Disciplinary
Partnerships.
The position in the Netherlands
is that full partnerships wi th
"similar" professions such as Tax
Advisers and Notaries are allowed
Partherships with Accountants are
also permitted but as yet none
have been formed. The basic
requirement is that the members
must be subject to disciplinary
rules comparable to those
applicable to lawyers and provide
that as a result thereof no
obligation is imposed that could
jeopardise
the
free
and
independent exercise of the
profession.
In Germany the larger legal part-
nerships have not entered into
Multi Disciplinary Partnerships
because they believe that to do so
would prevent Accountants, Tax
Advisers and Patent Agen ts
referring work to them on a
reciprocal basis.
On the question of discipline for
lawyers working outside their
home territory, the general feeling
seemed to be that the rules of the
host territory should be the ones
that applied but t hat the
disciplinary process should be
carried out by the home Society.
The Council of the Law Society
has taken no decisions in relation
to Multi Disciplinary practices (the
matter is currently being consid-
ered by the Professional Purposes
Committee). However in our
submissions to the Department of
Justice in connection with the
forthcoming Solicitors Bill we have
asked that there be included
enabling sections which would
permit
Mu l ti
National
or
International Legal Practice
Partnerships, incorporation either
with limited or unlimited liability of
legal
practices
and
Mu l ti
Disciplinary Partnerships, if and
when it is decided that this is the
appropriate course to follow. Some
people argue that the correct
phrase is not Multi Disciplinary but
Multi Professional.
All in all it was a most stimulating
few days and confirms once again,
as many of my predecessors have
discovered, that the problems
seem to be very similar in very
many different jurisdictions.
•
MAURICE R. CURRAN,
President.
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