Archive for December 2017

The secret Law Society Disciplinary Committees

Following on from the previous post

As we saw   the law society   nurtures and disciplines its own members, this  can be like the  mother of a very spoilt  child  , if the child is a favourite its a case  of  Now Johnny you go and be a good boy mummy will be very cross if you do that again .  or if  the child  is  not liked  a step  child or a foreign lawyer for example  then   there will be a crucifixion   so that a message is sent to the  others and to show that the system is working .

The  disciplinary side of the law society is  undertaken  through statute, the lawyers and conveyancers act .

The conflicting roles of the law society are set in statute .. statute is written by lawyers   and  as with the animal welfare  Act, there is concrete evidence that statutes are written  and advised on by lawyers .

(The animal welfare act , no 1 bill was written by Barrister Neil Wells  to facilitate his own business plan, he advised on this as independent advisor to the select committee without declaring his conflict of interest   )

The resulting swiss cheese legislation has sufficient holes for the lawyers to crawl through  and evade the intention of the law.

section 65  sets out the  Regulatory functions 

The regulatory functions of the New Zealand Law Society are—

(a)to control and regulate the practice in New Zealand by barristers and by barristers and solicitors of the profession of the law:

(b)to uphold the fundamental obligations imposed on lawyers who provide regulated services in New Zealand:

(c)to monitor and enforce the provisions of this Act, and of any regulations and rules made under it, that relate to the regulation of lawyers:

(d)to monitor and enforce, throughout the period specified in any order made under section 390, the provisions of this Act, and of any regulations and rules made under it, that relate to the regulation of conveyancers:

(e)to assist and promote, for the purpose of upholding the rule of law and facilitating the administration of justice in New Zealand, the reform of the law.

It is my experience that the  law society  is very poor at holding lawyers accountable to the rule of  Law    and that is where  our entire justice system falls  down . Close enough is not good enough , lawyers  are officers of the court and as such   have higher obligations to truth and honesty  than the average Joe Bloggs  , and we all know that  many lawyers  don’t know the definition of truth.

In a recent decision from the law society the society stated that

The lawyer is an agent for the client in conducting the client’s affairs. The lawyer is obliged to follow the instructions of the client where it is consistent with their professional duties. The lawyer has a duty of absolute loyalty to the client and may not have regard for the interests of third parties except insofar as they are consistent with his or her own instructions and relevant to the protection and promotion of the interests of his or her own client.”

This may be true  but  this is surely limited to   being an officer of the court first  this  is spelled out in  section 4  of the act

the obligation to protect, subject to his or her overriding duties as an officer of the High Court and to his or her duties under any enactment, the interests of his or her clients.

This  to me at least makes it clear that the  lawyers primary obligations are to the court  and  he has a duty not to mislead the court or to use the court for an improper purpose .

Time and time again we see   that lawyers  are not being held accountable   to the rule of law  and because they know that  this particular bit of the rules is purposely overlooked they use it  to abuse the use of the court.

In these hard time of lawyers being paid upward of $250  per hour  its about winning ,  no matter how. When   a group of  people   are backing each other up and  no one is being  held accountable to the rule of law then  injustice   reigns.

As a result  it is our observation  that the new Zealand courts have become extremely unsafe .

When a lawyer  steps out of line the first step is to  make a complaint to the law society .

We made a complaint against a lawyer in April 2016, the  quote above came from the decision which was delivered by an anonymous group of people represented with the name and signature of only  one barrister who signed the decision  on 28 November 2017 .

Law  society  disciplinary  committees  are made up of up to seven lawyer members and two lay members , however  the standards committees appear to work   from a position of total anonymity aside from a requirement to notify the minister of the appointment 

Standards committees are set up under section  126  of the act , they appear to be  are totally anonymous  and  are in reality not a legal structure which is capable of being sued or suing,  but   they are regularly represented in court proceedings as if they have  every right of a legal or natural person .

Standard committees in effect are nothing more than  a trading name given to a  group of unidentified persons  , at best it is an unincorporated group and the  rules in law dictate that  they  should be treated as naming the individuals  as members of the what ever trust  or committee.

The decisions  of the committees are listed here look at them the  majority have the lawyers names anonymised despite the fact that many lawyers  who have come to their attention  have  committed real crimes and have never been held accountable  in  another court .

There is a good chance that the  lawyers on the   disciplinary committees   are connected to  the  lawyer  under review  due to them  belonging to a secondary alliance   whihc many law firms  have formed for example

 NZ LAW Limited which is according to the companies office  jointly owned by 55 lawyers , this  from this link 

This is not the only   law firm made up  of many others , there are also  LAW ALLIANCE NZ LIMITED 34 share holders   and LARGE LAW FIRMS GROUP LIMITED 9 share holders  and probably more .

All in all there is nothing at all transparent about  the disciplinary process  , it behind closed doors and as seen  with the example   takes  a very long time for a complain to come out the other end  1 year 7 months   in the example above .

the decision is delivered with this  note

Decisions of the Standards Committee must remain confidential between the parties unless the Standards Committee directs otherwise. The Standards Committee has made no such direction in relation to this matter.

But  despite the  fact that  they decide to back their lawyer members up  for not  complying with the rule of law  there is  an avenue open to appeal their decision  and that is through  the LCRO       and that is even more fascinating.. to be continued

 

Why the New Zealand justice system is prone to corruption

Has any one else noticed that the  New Zealand Law society appears to be   at the centre of every thing in New Zealand .

It has more power than government  as  its members are the advisers to government  and local bodies and the  judges are selected from the membership by  another  member or former member.  In the last government Christopher Francis Finlayson QC member of the NZ law society and Attorney-General  selected  fellow members   to be judges. His recommendations was accepted  by the governor_general

In all over the years he appointed the majority of our judges  this from Kiwi’s first 

this from the  Courts of New Zealand web  page  

it goes on to say that “Judges have been appointed whose career paths have not been those of the conventional court advocate.”

and ” The appointment process followed by the Attorney-General is not prescribed by any statute or regulation.”

Many years ago I heard  a presentation by Anthony Molloy QC  who hit the nail on the head when he said   ” nothing is going to change until  one day a judge, while playing golf  is hit on the head  by a golf ball. Requiring urgent  brain surgery he  arrives in theatre   to find that there are no  brain surgeons available , but the staff reassure him  that  the  surgeon a highly qualified and respected Gynecologist .  They are all doctors after all.”

A list of judges of the high court is shown  here   all those appointed after 2008 were recommended by Finlayson 30  out of a total of  39  justices

Of the 7 associate judges  four were recommended by Finlayson.

Appointment of judges in the UK 

the head of the court is of course the Queen  it is her court , in days of old the king/queen  would  be the ultimate decision maker and was advised by the knights templar and    secular .  Below crown  was the privy  council , the crowns closest advisors   and  this  has over the years become  this highest appellate court , but New zealand did away with this and the question therfor eis    are they still the queens court ehan the queen and her advisors have no role to play.

Since April 2006, judicial appointments have been the responsibility of an independent Judicial Appointments Commission.

They effectively  did away with the system  that we  still hold on to . A system which   lacks transparency  and  independence.

The New Zealand Law society 

A judge   has to have held  a practicing certificate for at least 7 years   and generally  those appointed to the bench    leave the law society to  take on their   position and  if they leave  the bench  they will again become a member of the law society .

The New Zealand Law society has the conflicting roles of regulatory and nurturing for barristers and solicitors alike  .

In the UK  these duties are split between a regulatory  authority such as the solicitors regulatory authority   for regulatory matters  and the law society for   support assistance and nurturing of the  lawyers who are solicitors.  The lawyers who are  Barristers belong to  a bar council  or one of the four inns of court  and are regulated by the  bar standards Board 

why do we think  The New Zealand  justice system is open to corruption? well   this is a serial   you will have to drop back and read our stories  of the lack of transparency  and the   vast disparity between the ways lawyers are treated and  how others are treated