Dean's Address

The core problem we face as professionals is to rationalize the limits within which paralegals can practice. In Ontario, we are attempting to develop standards and limits. We are assuming a proactive position in the matter of paralegals and we are advising the government (at its request) with respect to minimum standards of training and qualification required for the licensing of paralegals, as well as delineating clearly the confines of the legal services they will be permitted to provide.

The main challenge that government and the profession face is to ensure standards, training, accountability in terms of discipline and in terms of financial responsibility, errors and omissions and compensation on the part of paralegals. At this point, the province is wrestling with a system that would be operated either by the Law Society or by government, or a combination of both, to ensure the proper place for paralegals within the system of justice.

Education and standards, of course, are not only a concern with respect to paralegals. They must pervade the whole profession. We have to provide the public with the assurance that those who are called to the Bar are sufficiently trained and continue, long after called to the Bar, to remain competent. The public must have confidence that practising lawyers are, at the very least, not a danger to the clients who retain them.

In Ontario, all the formal legal education within the province is provided by the law schools operated by six major universities, requiring full‑time, three year attendance, usually after at least a degree at the Bachelor level. The Law Society of Upper Canada does not attempt to control curricula, although it does maintain committees which work closely with the law schools to assist and advise with respect to curricula.

The history in Ontario has been to insist that all candidates for admission to the Bar after law school must article for at least one year under a rigidly controlled system operated by the Law Society in order to ensure that a high standard of training is available to all qualifying students Of law.

The Society requires students, after articling for a year, to attend a full time Bar Admission course which lasts approximately six months and is designed to provide practical training. The course is staffed by the profession and a full‑time faculty, and is run by the Law Society.

In many ways, legal education in Ontario involves a series of checks and balances. Legal education in and of itself is not sufficient criteria for admission to the bar. The period of training under the Society provides for a compulsory review of every candidate for admission to the Bar to assure that candidates are appropriate for admission in terms of character, integrity, professional conduct and qualifications.

The profession's primary role is to ensure that those who are provided with the privilege of the rights of practising law meet basic, minimum and uniform standards.

Any discussion of the public perception of the legal profession would be remiss if it did not examine the question of fees and services.

The most important contributor to the perception that lawyers overcharge, in my opinion, has been the excesses allegedly occurring with respect to contingency fees.

Contingency fees exist in every jurisdiction in North America except one, and that is Ontario. The history behind that is perhaps as much because of historical conservatism as any other factor. That is coupled with a feeling among many lawyers that contingency fees were both improper because of the interest the lawyer had in the outcome of the claim, and because the fees generated, particularly in the United States, were perceived to be too high.

In Ontario, that is changing. The Law Society of Upper Canada has finally recognized a place for contingency fees as a means of permitting access to justice particularly for the middle class where such access really was unavailable in many types of cases because of the prohibition in Ontario against lawyers taking cases on a contingency basis. In introducing them, though, it is fair to say that the Canadian experience is to charge percentage contingency fees that are, and hopefully will be, considerably lower than in the United States.

This is not to suggest that the American system should be changed, but rather to suggest that the perception in Canada is that higher contingency fees only add to the real cost of legal services. And, to a degree, in Canada that would be unacceptable.

I also want to comment briefly on the discrepancy of remuneration within the legal system. On average, the defence lawyers in this Academy, in every way as competent and brilliant and hard working as any plaintiff lawyer, routinely earn as little as 25 percent of what is earned by their plaintiff peers. Whether that is justified or whether it indicates something is wrong with the system, I am not in position to answer. I simply bring it up to point it out and to suggest that as a profession, it is a matter we should seriously address.

In the final analysis, ladies and gentlemen, we must conclude that we have been sorely wanting in communicating our message to the public. We have failed to blow our own horns, and we are paying the price for that every day.

I have outlined some of the positive programs we have put into place in Ontario and I know that many other jurisdictions have initiated equally, or more admirable schemes. We have succeeded in bringing the law to the people, in opening up the legal profession to public scrutiny and in trying to ensure a high degree of honesty, integrity, competence and accountability in our profession.

The problem is that we're about the only ones who know it.

What the legal profession obviously needs is a proactive, responsive public relations effort which would be available to reply immediately to criticisms such as those levelled by Secretary Fitzwater and others, as well as concentrated efforts to anticipate negative or unfavourable reactions to situations that arise in the legal community. We as a profession, have been terribly slow to grasp the public relations and communications opportunities before us and to see those communications efforts through to a positive end.

This is more than simply a self‑serving exercise in public relations or an effort just to have the public think more kindly toward the legal profession. It is, in fact, an imperative response to attacks which threaten the very foundation of our profession and our democratic system of justice.

It is vital in a true democracy that the legal profession be considered by the public to be a strong, impartial advocate in an ongoing endeavour to continually maintain an objective system of justice. The fact that the legal profession is such, but is in no way perceived to be, is a threat to the very democratic principles in which we believe.

The profession is failing in its duty to the public in declining to respond to the misperceptions. And the profession will fail in its fundamental duty if it simply limits itself to such things as appropriate self-policing and the provision of standards. It must also deal with unfavourable perceptions that exist as well as to respond quickly to legitimate complaints and the changes that need to be made within the profession.

We must first determine exactly what the irritants are between the public and the profession and deal with those points at which the two collide. The majority of our efforts, to date, have dealt with internal matters and to that extent, I suppose is is fair to say we have left ourselves open to accusations of navel gazing. Our efforts in the future must focus on external irritants and the resolution of conflicts which prejudice our public identity.

Governing bodies of the profession, themselves, generally have done less than the Bar Associations, organizations such as the various colleges and this illustrious Academy, with respect to the public relations efforts on behalf of the profession.

While I cant speak for any jurisdiction but my own, my opinion is that governing bodies should be taking a leadership role in educating and informing the public with respect to what our profession is doing and what it is really about.

For those of us who have been around long enough to know, there is no question that any comparison between the legal profession today and what is was 40 years ago is impossible.

We have done so much more, we have advanced so far from what we used to be. The impetus remains there to do more in all areas of responsibility to the public. As it is, however, we can only take comfort in the fact that we know it is improving I am strongly of the view that these advances, and the impetus to continue, exist in all jurisdictions with which I am even vaguely familiar.

I ask you, is there any reason to think that the impetus must stop? I can't think of any. The public's capacity to demand higher and higher professional standards certainly hasn't diminished. And God help us if that changes. In the end it lies in the hands of the lawyers to improve the perception, to raise the image of our profession and, of course, to continue to strive to improve standards and ethics.

My message today is not all bad news. But it is a challenge to do even better, to concentrate our efforts on communication, on two‑way dialogue with the public media and on raising the profile of the legal profession to the high level it so rightly deserves.

After all, I think that we would all agree that the more the profession can do to develop a solid image and to instill a high level of confidence in the judicial system, the better and stronger our nations will be.