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GAZETTE
APRIL 1977
The Auditor has rightly referred to the extent of the
people's ignorance of the Law and the extent of their
rights under the Law. We must accordingly consider the
extent of the citizen's need for legal advice and then the
extent of the responsibility of the State to provide such
advice and the range and area over which such advice
should extend. There must of necessity be constraints
upon the extent to which this advice can be provided, but
I am concerned in particular with the. extent of the
responsibility of the Legal Profession to provide legal
services. I am in particular concerned that there should be
an awareness on the part both of the State and the public
as to where a Citizens' Advice Service should end and
where a Legal Aid scheme should begin.
Having regard to the rapid development of statutory
tribunals in this country, the general lack of knowledge
on the part of the public of their rights before such
tribunals, coupled with recent Court decisions, the
Incorporated Law Society of Ireland is emphatic that
from the inception of a scheme of Civil Legal Aid which I
earnestly hope will soon be provided, it should embrace
proceedings before Statutory Appeal Boards, Social
Welfare Appeals and all such Tribunals where the
enforcement of the rights of the citizens is concerned.
I am aware that the Committee on Civil Legal Aid has
been meeting continually for the past two 'and half years
to consider and make recommendations on a difficult
problem. While commending the members of the
Committee for their work in a difficult task, I would hope
that a report will be presented at an early date and that
the recommendations will be implemented without delay,
notwithstanding the financial constraints of the present
time.
The title of the Auditors paper, gives me the oppor-
tunity to turn for a moment to look at the only existing
legal aid service — that for Criminal Legal Aid.
Introduced on an experimental basis in 1965, with the co-
operation of the professions, to enable the State to meet
its international obligations, in recent years, the Scheme
has encountered difficulties and lost much of that good-
will. On the financial side, the failure of the State to match
remuneration with continuing inflation, has not encour-
aged the solicitors' profession to embrace the scheme in a
wholehearted way, much as I, the President of the
Society, would wish them to do so. Indeed, the present
unsatisfactory situation, as evidenced by the lack of
appreciation shown by the National Prices Commission
will lead many of the more experienced solicitors to turn
their back upon the Scheme. This at a time when,
following from the
Healy
v.
Foran
judgment in the
Supreme Court in July 1976, on entitlement to legal aid in
criminal matters, more and more defendants are being
awarded aid in the Courts. The whole situation is fraught
with difficulty to which no ready solution is obvious. For
its part, arising out of previous difficulties, the Society
through my predecessors in office, urged a compre-
hensive review of the Scheme. The Minister accepted the
recommendation, the Tormey Committee resulted and the
report is eagerly awaited. More so indeed than that of the
Pringle Committee, in that it is dealing with an ongoing
scheme in imminent danger of breaking down.
Last October, it was my privilege to attend an inter-
national symposium on Legal Aid in London. On the
criminal side, one of the speakers outlined the U.S. experi-
ence since the
Gideon
v.
Wainwright
judgment in the U.S.
Supreme Court in 1963 (the parallel of our
Healy v.
Foran).
It would appear that criminal work has become
66
highly specialised and has increased out of all propor-
tions. Applying the experience to this country, one is
forced to ask the question whether the present organ-
isation within the professions and within the Courts is
adequate to handle, the massive increase in case work
which is proverbially around the corner. The question
must also be posed as to whether the non-specialist
lawyer in the country town will continue to be able to
provide an adequate service in this area.
Being conscious of the degree of specialisation
which a developed system of criminal legal aid will bring
with it, I am personally forced to the conclusion that not-
withstanding the problems, the criminal scheme should
continue to be administered as a separate entity at least
until the Scheme of Civil Legal Aid is functioning
adequately.
Up to now the legal profession has accepted its social
responsibility to prqvide Legal Aid on a voluntary basis,
but unfortunately this is no longer sufficient to cope with
the extent of the public's requirement for legal services
and the liability of large sections of the public to pay for
these services. It is of vital importance to be aware of the
fact that experience from other countries has
demonstrated that such obligations placed on the legal
profession have been difficult to translate into effective
legal services. The profession in this country as in many
other countries of similar size and economic wealth is too
small and its economic prosperity is too limited to make it
a viable source of funds or services for the population at
large. This must be accepted both by the population and
the government. In this regard of considerable
significance are recent decisions of the Austrian
Constitutional Court and the European Commission of
Human Rights striking down Legal Aid Schemes based
upon compulsory, gratuitous service by lawyers, in effect
on the ground that the burden thus placed on individual
lawyers was inequitable and therefore inappropriate.
The Auditor has clearly set out the way in which legal
aid is being provided at present and I would like to take
this opportunity of publicly paying tribute to the work of
the Free Legal Advice (F.L.A.C.) Centres, staffed by
students and gratuitously assisted by members of the legal
profession whose work is recognised by the government
in the form of a small grant.
I hope that in its report the Pringle Committee will
accept that a comprehensive system of Legal Aid cannot
be formulated on the basis of being a lost leader for the
legal profession, who must be adequately remunerated for
the work they will undertake.
Before closing I would like to consider the likely effect
of the introduction of a comprehensive scheme of Legal
Aid on the legal profession itself. The nature of the
services being provided by the legal profession and the
range of its activities are ever changing and are
undoubtedly on the increase. I would urge upon the
profession an acceptance of the need for change and also
the fact that this does not necessarily involve a sacrifice of
our principles, our standards, or ethics, or traditions or
our code of professional conduct. I feel that we should be
ever mindful of Edmund Burke's dictum "that the practice
of law while it broadens the intellect narrows the mind".
There is an urgent necessity for a comprehensive
scheme of Civil Legal Aid in this country and I fully
support this call for the establishment of such a scheme. I
have every confidence and belief that the legal profession
will fully play its part in the implementation and operation
of such a scheme.