The Gazette 1975

Computers Can and Do Help Lawyers

Over the weekend 27th-29th September, 1974, the Society held its first Conference on Computers and the Law at Oxford. The Conference may fairly be described as international, since its 156 delegates came from 16 different countries. Over half were lawyers. The Conference dealt with matters of direct practical importance to lawyers, such as Land Charges and Accounting systems; but it also allowed delegates a glimpse of the future in information retrieval. The topics covered by papers and discussion were backed by practical demonstrations of working systems, the theme throughout the Conference being, not merely that computers are able to aid lawyers, but that they are already doing so. The Conference opened with a champagne reception in the Colonnade of Magdalen College, followed by an introductory talk on computers by Mr. Norman Price of the U.K. Atomic Energy Authority. On the Saturday morning, Mr. Colin Tapper gave the history of in- formation retrieval by computer, paying particular attention to the systems demonstrated at the Confer- ence — LEXIS, STATUS, IBM's STAIRS package, and Queen's University, Belfast's QUOBIRD system which was demonstrated live with help from Inter- national Computers Limited. Mr. Tapper pointed out that the first two were primarily designed for legal materials and the last two were adapted for the law. Mr. Tapper also discussed the Italian Court of Cassa- tion system, designed by Univac, who staged an excell- ent audio-visual presentation at the Conference. Mr. Tapper described the respective merits of recording a full text as against the provision merely of an index to information, maintaining that the one system did not necessarily exclude the other. This talk was followed by detailed discussions of information retrieval systems. Mr. Jerome Rubin, President of Mead Data Central, Inc., described how LEXIS, a system originally developed for the Ohio Bar, and now available elsewhere in America, allows lawyers in their offices and judges in court to retrieve federal and state statutes and court decisions. This system was demonstrated by satellite from America. Dr. B. Niblett of the University of Kent, Canterbury, discussed the STATUS system of the U.K. Atomic Energy Authority, of which he is a pioneer. This provides techniques for searching and browsing through statutes and statutory instruments. Professor F. J. Smith of Belfast discussed QUOB I RD and M. André Wallemacq spoke about the Belgian CREDOC system, which provides quick documentation for the legal profession in Belgium and is largely financed by that profession.

Saturday afternoon was devoted to a different area of computer applications for lawyers — legislative and Government systems. Mr. Stephen Skelly, Jurimetrics Adviser to the Department of Justice of the Govern- ment of Canada, spoke of the advantages and difficul- ties of using a computer for legislative drafting. In the discussion that followed, Mr. Francis Bennion, a British Parliamentary Counsel, described an experi- ment he is about to start in this field. The Canadian experience in providing assistance via the computer seems to show distinct advantages in the British context. Following this talk, the Chief Land Registrar, Mr. T. B. F. Ruoff, spoke of his system for Land Charges searching, which had gone live earlier in the same month, and is now being used by English and Welsh solicitors on a daily basis. Then Mr. R. A. Leylands of Leeds Corporation described the LAMIS project (Local Authority Management Information Systems) which Leeds in pioneering with help from International Com- puters Limited. This system is based on the property in an authority's area and (inter alia) is designed to provide relevant information needed by purchasers and developers for whom its interest lies in the possibility of a dramatic improvement in searching for local Land Charges and making Supplementary enquiries. On the Sunday, Mr. Richard Morgan of the Solic- itors' Law Stationery Society, Limited, spoke of Office Management Applications — legal accounting, trust accounts, time recording and drafting, with a glance at litigation support. He emphasised the importance of having a terminal for these systems fully compatible with systems for information retrieval. He described the systems demonstrated or displayed at the Conference including the Dataplex drafting and accounts system, Browne Time Sharing's Word One drafting system, the Law Society's Time Recording System marketed by Centre-File, and the Solicitors' Law Stationery Society's on-line accounts system and batch (off-line) accounts and time recording systems. Mr. Nicolas Bellord ,an English Solicitor, who has written his own on-line accounts and time recording systems, (both demonstrated at the Conference), raised a number of practical points, particularly stressing the importance of using a computer on those aspects of a lawyer's work that took so much of his time. The last session consisted of brief reports from a number of distinguished overseas visitors from Sweden, Norway, and ^West Germany. This was followed by a general discussion which concerned itself largely with a proportion of time a lawyer spends on a search. The closing paper was given by Mr. Alan Woods, Chair- man of the Society.

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