Failings of the Law Association

He went on to say that if justice in the new palace (the Hall of Justice had just been opened) was to be as sweet as the Honourable Attorney General envisaged, then those matters must be confronted by those who had the power to do so.

The Attorney General at the time was, of course Mr Russell Martineau. Whether because of Mr Allum’s concerns or whether because it was already in the works, within one year, in the dying days of the Chambers Administration, Mr Martineau piloted through Parliament the Legal; Profession Act, 1986. And included in the Act was a Code of Ethics. The President assented to the Act on 1st October 1986.

As Attorney General, Mr Martineau was head of the Bar.

But, obviously, he thought that certain matters ought to have been left for the attention of the newly created Law Association and the Council of the Law Association.

Five sections of the Act make provision for the council/Law Association to make rules. They are as follows-

i.S.33 — power to make rules with respect to the keeping and operating of accounts of clients’ money by attorneys-at-law;

ii.S.35 (4) — power, with the approval of the Chief Justice, to amend the Third Schedule.

The Code of Ethics is contained in that Schedule;

iii.S. 52 (1) — power, with the approval of the Chief Justice and the Minister, to make rules prescribing and regulating the remuneration of attorneys-at-law in respect of non-contentious business;

iv.S.57 (5) — power to make rules with respect to the procedure to be followed in compensating persons who have suffered loss as a result of dishonesty on the part of an attorney-at-law or of his clerk or servant in connection with his practice or of any trust of which he is a trustee; and

v.S.58(6) — power to make rules with respect to the procedure to be followed in dealing with an application for a hardship grant to any person who has suffered loss where the attorney-at-law has failed to account for money due to a person in connection with his practice.

The provision here has not specifically required dishonesty on the part of the attorney-at-law, and the grant here is specifically named a hardship grant.

The Council has made rules only in respect of the remuneration of attorneys-at-law for non-contentious business. Those rules were made in 1997. Non-contentious business is, of course, legal work that is not directly connected with litigation eg the drafting of wills, deeds, leases, agreements, etc.

S. 34 of the Act does make provision for the Council to have power, on an order of a judge, to control the keeping and distribution of money held by a banker in a clients’ account. However, the power to make rules prescribing the mode of exercise of that power is thrust not on the Council but on the Rules Committee of the Supreme Court.

October 1 next year will be twenty years since the Act will have been in force. Mr Martineau is not now the Attorney General. But esteemed Senior Council is currently the President of the Law Association.

Surely, he did not expect when the Act was passed that the Council and the Law Association would have failed 20 years later to prescribe the rules referred to in the Act.

It is therefore incumbent on him and it would be part of his tremendous legacy to the profession and to the country to fill that gap before he demits office as President of The Law Association.

Do please, Sir, complete that which you started. The 20th anniversary of the coming into force of the Act which brought about the fusion of the legal profession is a fitting time by which to do so.

EMERSON JOHN-CHARLES

Hugh Wooding Law School