AN INDEPENDENT body to replace the existing regulatory functions of the Law Society and the Bar Council is the central proposal from the Minister for Justice in the Legal Services Bill announced yesterday.
The 260-page Bill, which is to be published by early next week, is required under the memorandum of understanding with the EU-IMF troika.
It builds on reforms put forward by the Competition Authority and the Legal Costs Working Group, Minister for Justice Alan Shatter said yesterday.
Other proposals include a legal costs adjudicator, who would lay out the basis for legal costs and provide for mediation or adjudication where they were disputed, and an independent body for complaints against barristers and solicitors. At the moment these are dealt with by disciplinary committees of the Bar Council and the Law Society, which have lay majorities.
Mr Shatter stressed the proposed 11-member Legal Services Regulatory Authority would be independent, with a lay majority and a lay chairperson. These would be appointed by the Government on the nomination of the Minister, he said, and must meet criteria laid down in the Bill. The authority is to report to the Oireachtas through the committees on justice and public accounts.
Asked if there was any mechanism for people to seek appointment to the new authority and be assessed by an independent body, he said there was no provision for this in the Bill, but a decision had yet to be made on whether there could be such a mechanism.
He said that both the Bar Council and the Law Society had done their best to keep a “Chinese wall” between their regulatory and representative functions, but this was not perceived by the public. “People want to see a clearly independent body,” he said.
Asked what would become of those working in the regulatory area for the Law Society, he said people with such qualifications would be needed by the new authority. “It will be independent of the Law Society,” he said.
The money spent by the Law Society and the Bar Council on their regulatory functions would therefore be freed up, and they would finance the new authority via a levy, he said.
The new authority would have responsibility for a wide range of functions, including drawing up a code of conduct for the professions, proposing regulations for them, monitoring admissions policies to the legal profession and accrediting educational institutions to provide legal professional training. This would end the monopoly on such training currently exercised by the King’s Inns and the Law Society.
It would also conduct research on other issues, including reviewing the structure of the legal professions, including unifying the two professions, introducing a new profession of “conveyancer” for property transactions, partnerships between barristers and between them and solicitors and direct access to barristers for contentious matters.
The Bill will also contain provisions for solicitors to become senior counsel and to jointly act as advocates with barristers, making the wearing of wigs and gowns voluntary in all courts and ending the practice whereby junior counsel charge two-thirds of a senior counsel’s fees in a case.
Both solicitors and barristers will be required to provide detailed bills of costs with specified information. This will have to be reviewed on a regular basis, and clients informed of costs changes to the initial bill.
Mr Shatter said he would also provide, in new bankruptcy legislation, for barristers and solicitors who become bankrupt through their involvement in commercial matters unconnected with their profession to be able to continue to practise in order to support themselves and repay creditors.
LEGAL REFORM MAIN POINTS
A Legal Services Regulatory Authority will be set up to oversee the legal professions;
An office of Legal Costs Adjudicator will be set up to outline the basis for legal costs and adjudicate on disputed costs;
An independent Legal Professions Disciplinary Tribunal will be set up to deal with complaints about professional misconduct;
The Legal Services Regulatory Authority will have 11 members, seven of them lay members to be appointed by the Government on the nomination of the Minister for Justice, two each nominated by the Law Society and the Bar Council, with an independent lay chairperson;
It will prepare codes of conduct for the legal professions and prepare reports on opening up legal professional education to third-level institutions and new models of business organisation for lawyers;
The authority will be financed by a levy on the legal professions and will report to the Oireachtas through its committees;
The Legal Costs Adjudicator will outline the information that must be given to clients in advance, recommend mediation or adjudicate on disputes and publish rulings on costs;
The complaints committee will have a lay majority and will deal directly with clients' complaints, which will no longer go to the disciplinary tribunals of the professional bodies. It will have extensive powers, including striking off a practitioner.