Professor Ron Sackville and his Access to Justice Advisory Committee have done an extraordinary job in the past seven months in producing a 500-page report on ways to improve access to justice. Professor Sackville delivered his report this week to the Attorney-General, Michael Lavarch, who has outlined a process to convert the recommendations of the report into action.
Among its recommendations were: contingency fees (no-win, no-fee); lawyers to freely advertise everything, including fees; abolition of scale fees and a requirement that lawyers tell clients the fees beforehand; an complaints body independent of the legal profession; televising of some court proceedings; abolition of wigs and gowns; more and better directed legal aid; more alternative dispute resolution; more court-controlled case management; simpler legislation; cheaper electronic access to legislation on database; better harmony of the laws of the states.
A couple of commendable aspects to the recommendations stand out. Often the major recommendations of committee involved in questions of social justice respond with calls to throw dollars at the problem. The vast majority of this committee’s recommendations are commonsense changes to practice that will cost nothing. Secondly, the vast bulk of the changes will not result in a transfer of money from the well-off to the not-so-well off. Indeed, the wealthy will have as much to gain from the recommendations as the not so well-off.
The reason for this is that the report has concentrated on efficiency and competition _ not just in the legal profession, but in the courts and in government.
Predictably, the legal profession says that much of what the report recommends is already being done, or is about to be done, or is unnecessary or will not help, but that it will co-operate in implementing those of the recommendations it sees as worthwhile.
Mr Lavarch should not be distracted from the commendable task he set himself when he became Attorney-General _ to make justice more accessible.
At the core of that is changing the practices of the legal profession and the practices of the courts. The wigs and gowns must come off and the chilly wind of competition be allowed to blow through the legal profession, blowing the dust of inefficiency and cosy monopolistic practice out of the Australian legal system.
In most states and territories the legal profession (like other professions) makes too difficult for complainants to get redress for bad practice. The profession has to be overseen by non-lawyers. There is no general requirement for lawyers to give detailed quotes on jobs. A start has been made with advertising, but there needs to be more. With competition comes action to reduce costs and to pass savings to the consumer.
There is no excuse for the states and territories in not joining the moves. Governments of both persuasions have embraced competition policy in commerce because it benefits consumers and society generally. The legal profession is no exception.
The report wisely warns there is no single, simple solution to the high cost of justice and recognises that cheap and swift solutions by courts are more likely to be unfair. That is why it has attacked the problem on all fronts with more than a hundred detailed recommendations. It is not hopeless. Little by little, the justice system can be made more efficient, cheaper and therefore more accessible. People in Australia should not have to surrender their rights because, as the report concluded, the cost of justice is too high.