Judicial research posts a priority for Clarke

Trust is a solicitor’s most valuable asset says Frank Clarke

Chief Justice Frank Clarke is to create a new post of judicial assistant from September 2018, and has said that increasing the level of research back-up for judges is a project that is very close to his heart.

Speaking at the parchment ceremony at Blackhall Place on 26 October 2017, he said that the qualification of fifty new solicitors was an appropriate occasion to address the matter with the Law Society, ahead of extensive negotiations on the new system.

He said that Irish judges have an embarrassingly low level of back-up, in comparison with other, often poorer countries.

 “Litigation is more complex nowadays. Judges can be much more efficient if they have help. From my own perspective, half of those judgments that a judge writes could be written by any competent lawyer. The first half of a judgment is describing a case, not deciding a case.

“Help in researching cases in advance, or looking up difficult issues afterwards, can also make judges more efficient,” he pointed out.

Under the new move, a thirteen-month contract will be offered to a group of recently-qualified lawyers, bar or solicitor, to work for either the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court.

“The pay won’t be great but the opportunities will be. For anyone who might work in litigation, it would be invaluable experience,” the Chief Justice said.

The thirteen-month contract will allow for an overlap between each year’s intake, at the start of the new legal year each September.

He pointed out that solicitors will have an advantage over barristers for these jobs because they will have actually worked in a legal context before they qualify.

He said that the planned move will require the co-operation of the large commercial firms [from where the candidates will preferably be drawn] in releasing their employees for the thirteen-month period.

The new jobs will be advertised early in the New Year with the job offers made in late spring.

The Chief Justice said he will be in talks with the Law Society to iron out any potential conflicts of interests given the potential future traffic of employees between the large firms and the inside of the senior courts.

The Chief Justice congratulated the new graduates and asked them to turn and thank, with a round of applause, those loved ones who had supported them along the road.

Pointing to a huge difference in the practising professions the Chief Justice said that, unlike barristers newly-called to the bar, those receiving their parchments were already working in the law.

“I suspect many of you will be doing much the same work next Monday as you were doing last Monday,” he said.

'Regulation is necessary'

But, he said, the parchment ceremony is hugely important symbolically because of the trust vested in those with legal qualifications. Regulation is necessary to ensure that this trust is well-earned, he continued.

“Ethics are of the highest importance,” he commented, saying that matters can be dealt with either by trust or by bureaucracy.

“If people can trust what’s happening, you don’t need the same level of paperwork or bureaucracy. Systems work a lot better if people can be trusted.”

He said that trust is implicitly given to everyone who is qualified as a legal professional but that if trust is lost, it’s very hard to get it back.

“Trust is a hugely valuable part of your armoury. It’s something that can’t be valued in money but if it’s lost it will act to your very considerable detriment,” he told newly-qualified solicitors.

The Chief Justice said the parchment ceremony is important in a symbolic way because it means that newly-minted solicitors are now trusted to do certain types of work, to stand up in a court and represent a client, to engage in certain types of transactions. That trust needs to be maintained.”

The Chief Justice said that one of the challenges of his job was making sure the courts keep up with the pace of technological change pointing to the move in the Supreme Court to allow leave to appeal applications to be filed online.

“[The court system] does need to change or it will cease to be relevant,” he said.

“Before the Great Recession, the annual budget for the courts service in the technology field was nine to ten million euro a year. At the bottom it was four million, which meant it was just about able to keep the show on the road.

Radical

“I think the government needs to increase the budget in a much more radical way to allow us to adopt more technology in the courts,” he said pointing to a need for discussion with the practising professions on standardisation of platforms in use.

“It’s easy for big well-resourced firms to adopt technology but the court system has to be every bit as good for the small two-partner firm in a provincial town as for everyone else,” he said.

Pointing to a huge difference in the practising professions the Chief Justice said that, unlike barristers newly-called to the bar, those receiving their parchments were already working in the law.

“I suspect many of you will be doing much the same work next Monday as you were doing last Monday,” he said.

Speaking about his recent appointment as Chief Justice, Frank Clarke said that the public perception was that his background was not typical of the legal profession.

“One journalist writing about my appointment said he had ‘risen from the mean streets of Walkinstown’.

“I still have a lot of friends in Walkinstown, and they don’t think they live on mean streets." he quipped.

“There’s a small group of us who were in the same class at Drimnagh Castle and we are having dinner together tomorrow night. I expect the first fifteen minutes will be a denunciation of me for allowing our home place to be brought into disrepute!” he joked.

New solicitor Jennifer Preston swept the boards at the prize-giving, scooping three awards: overall winner for Professional Practice Course, part one; joint winner in probate and tax and second place in conveyancing.

Law Society President Stuart Gilhooly told the attendance that the legal profession has always been able to adapt to change and that is the key to its survival.

“Technology is going to play a much bigger role than it ever did before,” he said. “We are told that artificial intelligence is going to disrupt the legal market even further. We need to be prepared for that.

“The legal profession never, ever hides. It always adapts. We have adapted in the past and we will again,” he said, emphasising the need to move with the times and make technology work for the profession.

Humility

He urged the virtue of humility on the new solicitors and asked them to always try to get on with their colleagues.

“If you’re tempted to write a stinker of a letter, don’t do it. Pick up the phone,” he advised.