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Law
LSRA to bring client benefit
Gibraltar’s legal profession is experiencing one of its greatest shake-ups in 50 years, while events have brought it into the international spotlight, Ray Spencer reports
former Bar Council - has the task of forming the LSRA. As chief executive, the ex-Hassans partner, is ensuring money laundering and other staff are in place as well as “an outreach programme to the wider legal profession”.
As Caruana put it: “There is a supposition that lawyers will be familiar with the new legislation, but it can’t be assumed; the outreach will be privately and through the media to ensure that people comply with the registration process.”
Over the next three years Dumas will sift any complaints made against lawyers to establish their veracity, prior to more detailed consideration and adjudication by the six-strong LSRA Board made up of a mix of appointees external to the profession and lawyers, including the Law Council chairman at the time.
“My aim is to ensure that this new LSRA regime gets off to a good, credible start and that consumers, who may have complaints against lawyers, realise appreciate and perceive this is not the inmates running the asylum, and if they make complaints that they will be investigated in a timely and effective fashion, and [if appropriate] proper redress will be given” Caruana declared. “It [the LSRA] has got to have credibility from birth.”
Conduct code
According to Caruana, “there are more than 20 cases in the pipeline ranging from the “unmeritorious ones to complaints that may be meritorious, but relate to completely unimportant matters, to the more important things”.
The jurisdiction's legal profession has grown significantly since the 90s, largely the result of expansion in financial services and eGaming, as well as burgeoning property development in more recent years, all requiring support from attorneys.
Extensive use has been made of government legal drafting services supported by lawyers in private practice to prepare new and updated statutes to cover EU directives and emerging markets. In recent years, the workload has intensified from the BREXIT issue, which affects Gibraltar as being part of the UK’s membership of the EU.
But from May all 300+ lawyers – working in Gibraltar law firms, government departments, official bodies and, for the first time, within businesses – must be registered to receive practicing certificates from the embryo Legal Services Regulatory Authority (LSRA), a recently-created statutory body responsible for the registration and regulation of the jurisdiction’s legal profession.
At present, there is no complete list of lawyers: the Gibraltar Courts Service in November identified 245 people – barristers and solicitors in a fused profession for court appearances (unlike England where only
barristers are able to do so) – working in some 40 law firms. The Bar Council (now known as the Law Council) list from January 2019 gave 156 names as members, including some from the private sector.
Founding Chairman of the LSRA, Sir Peter Caruana QC, a former Chief Minister for 15 years and arch litigator, revealed his initial budget of £480,000 would be met from a tariff of varying annual fees ranging from £300 to £1,250 for individuals, including business in-house lawyers. Law firms will need to pay £1,000-£2,500pa dependent on the number of practice partners.
All being regulated
“The Bar Council has never been more than a representative body of lawyers – almost the lawyers’ trade union – but it is not essential, nor mandatory, to be a member although most lawyers are,” Caruana declared. He added: “We will be publishing a list, and although we have not discussed it, I cannot imagine that a register and role of certificated lawyers should be anything other than public, certainly by May when the 2020 practicing certificates are issued.”
David Dumas QC, one of Gibraltar’s most senior lawyers with a wealth of experience of the legal profession and its practice, including serving for many years as chairman of the
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