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GAZETTE
APRIL
.
1993
Council Decides to Appoint
Lay Observers
The Council of the Law Society has
approved the appointment of two
Lay Observers to the Registrar's
Committee - the statutory
committee of the Society which
carries out the initial investigation of
complaints against solicitors made by
members of the public.
The proposal for Lay Observers,
which was made by the President of
the Society,
Raymond Monahan,
was
approved by the Council at its
meeting on 12 March last. The
Council agreed that the two Lay
Observers should be independently
nominated and the President decided
to ask the Minister for Justice to
nominate the two observers.
In presenting the proposal to the
Council, the President of the Society
argued the need for a more
transparent system of complaints-
handling so that there could be full
public validation and acceptance of
the manner in which the profession
dealt with complaints by members of
the public. The President said that
the perception existed that, because
complaints were dealt with behind
closed doors by practising solicitors
who were members of the Council,
complainants did not get fair
treatment. The profession would
never be able to counter this
criticism successfully, he said, until it
was in a position to demonstrate
publicly that its complaints-handling
procedures were fair and above
board. He pointed out that the Law
Society had already accepted the
principle of lay scrutiny when it had
agreed, in principle, with the
appointment of a legal adjudicator
as provided for by the Solicitors Bill.
Raymond Monahan suggested that,
while the two lay members could
not, strictly speaking, be members of
the Registrar's Committee, because it
was a committee of the Society to
which functions of the Council had
been delegated under Section 73 of
the Solicitors Act, 1954, they could
be given the right to receive the
agenda and to participate in the
deliberations of the committee. They
could also be given the right to make
recommendations to the Society
from time to time and could also
make reports to the Society and to
the Minister for Justice.
The Council fully endorsed the
President's suggestion and it was
agreed to proceed with the proposal,
subject only to drawing up
appropriate terms of appointment
for the observers containing
safeguards concerning confidentiality.
Terms of Appointment
As we go to press, work on drawing
up the terms has been completed
and the nominations of the Minister
for Justice are awaited. Each Lay
Observer will be appointed for a
period of one year and the
appointment may be renewed for
further periods. Each Lay Observer
will have the right to attend all
meetings of the Registrar's
Committee, to receive the agenda
and all relevant documentation in
advance of the meeting, and to
participate fully in the deliberations
of the Committee. In the event of a
vote being taken on any issue,
however, neither Lay Observer will
have the right to vote.
The Lay Observers will have the
right to furnish a report to the
Society.
The Lay Observers will also have
the right to make recommendations
from time to time to the Society
about the manner in which the
Registrar's Committee has dealt
with complaints, or the general
adequacy and fairness of the
complaints-handling machinery of
the Society.
At least once in every year the two
Lay Observers, acting jointly, will
have the right to furnish a report to
the Society giving their assessment
of the manner in which the Society
has in the past twelve months
exercised its functions in relation to
complaints against solicitors. The
report would have to be in a format
suitable for publication by the
Society but it cannot identify any
individual complainant or solicitor.
The Lay Observers will be obliged to
treat as strictly confidential any
information obtained by them in the
course of exercising their functions
and will not be permitted to divulge
information concerning the affairs of
any complainant or solicitor without
the prior written consent of the Law
Society.
Other issues raised at
March Meeting
The March Council meeting also
considered a survey recently
despatched by the Costs Committee,
the Finance Act, 1992, the
reintroduction of the Solicitors
(Amendment) Bill, 1991, and a recent
article in a Sunday newspaper.
Article in Sunday Business Post
The Council, discussed an article
entitled 'A Profession under Siege'
which was published in the Sunday
Business Post of 7 March. A number
of Council members were highly
critical of the article and the
comments attributed to
James
Osborne.
Some members defended
the right of practitioners to comment
publicly on matters of concern to the
profession. At the end of its
discussion, the Council agreed that
the President should write to Mr.
Osborne conveying the views
I expressed.
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