AMONG the proposed changes to the Legal Profession Act is a rather unusual clause which deals with the mental and physical well-being of a lawyer.
If passed, the new clause will allow the Law Society to apply for a judge to order a lawyer who is mentally or physically impaired to go for a medical examination.
The Law Society's council may also direct that a lawyer stop practising until he has undergone such tests.
The Attorney-General, who oversees the conduct of foreign lawyers here, will also get the same powers.
When asked to explain the rationale for this suggested change, a Law Ministry spokesman pointed to a case of a lawyer who was suffering from manic depressive psychosis but continued to practise for almost 10 years.
The lawyer, practising since 1995, had post-natal depression after giving birth to her first child in 1996.
After two months in a mental health institute, she could not hold down a job for any length of time - switching firms at least eight times.
In April 2003, she started her own firm but failed to maintain proper accounts and was suspended from practising for a year by the Court of Three Judges in 2005.
The ministry spokesman told The Straits Times: 'Apparently her condition was known to some others, but the Law Society had no powers to intervene on grounds of mental illness at that time.'
In delivering the judgment of the Court of Three Judges then, Judge of Appeal V.K. Rajah had asked whether the time was ripe to take further steps to 'examine the competence and fitness of all solicitors who aspire to commence a sole proprietorship'.
He had then called on Parliament and the Law Society to probe further on this issue.
This new clause was suggested by a committee led by Justice Rajah to develop the legal sector. Its recommendations were accepted by the Government last year and the Bill is expected to be presented in Parliament later this month.
The Law Ministry spokesman said the move is intended to fill a gap in the current law.
The Legal Profession Act currently allows the Law Society to intervene and take over the conduct of the firm for reasons such as if a lawyer becomes bankrupt or abandons his practice.
The Law Society can also step in when a lawyer is incapacitated by illness or accidents to the extent that he is unable to continue practising.
A lawyer who is found to be of unsound mind and incapable of managing himself or his affairs is also barred from applying for a practising certificate which is done annually.
The new amendment provides the powers to compel a lawyer whose fitness to practise is suspect to go for a medical examination.
Another lawyer, who had been practising on his own since 1973, was known by some in the profession to be suffering from a mental disorder but nothing could be done until he was caught dabbling with his clients' monies in 1982. He was disbarred a year later.
Drew & Napier's Tan Hee Joek said the new move would 'speed up the process of dealing with lawyers who are incapable of managing due to fitness problems and provide better protection for consumers and the public'.
The Association of Criminal Lawyers president Subhas Anandan said: 'Prevention in this way is better, but I am a bit puzzled about the part referring to physical fitness.
'I am bound to fail a physical test and others too,' quipped the lawyer of 33 years who had a string of health problems recently.
Mr Anandan, 60, suffered three heart attacks, lost a kidney to cancer in 2001 and takes about 15 different types of medication daily.
'I think physical fitness issues apply here when it affects a person mentally,' he said.
-TMB
No comments:
Post a Comment