The Gazette 1964/67

whom the profession has relied so largely in the past will over the years be replaced by qualified lawyers, as is the case extensively in the United States today. Certainly law offices are becoming mechanised in order to meet the staff position. The need for keeping up to date, while new laws emerge from Parliament with great rapidity and every day sees the delivery of dozens ot judgments interpreting the law in some new way, has already involved the general acceptance of the need for 'continuing education.' As regards the training of the future lawyer, its object must continue to be to produce at ; ts end a man or woman well grounded in legal principles and well versed in the practice and procedure of his or her chosen subject, competent both to accept and to meet his or her obligations to and in contemporary society. This means that the standard of intelligence and of general knowledge of a candidate for entry as a law student must remain high. He must acquire a sound knowledge of legal piin- ciples, receive a good practical training and reach a proper vocational level of legal learning, as distinct from the level set for a university degree in law, designed to be taken as a discipline by persons who by no means necessarily intend to embark upon the law as a career. As regards the practical training of the future solicitor, it is debatable whether the time-honoured system of service under articles of clerkship will remain adequate—certainly without careful 'vet ting' of the offices in which students are to serve. One of the most serious defects in the system of articled service is that the student can only receive practical training in the types of work under taken by the principal to whom he is articled and even then the extent of the training provided varies from office to office. Sooner or later courses of practical training are likely to have to be provided, possibly on the lines of an administrative staff college—at least for those who may be unable to secure a place as an articled clerk with one of the approved firms of practising lawyers. ft will no doubt, always be debatable at what stage in his chosen profession the young lawyer should start to specialise. In the law one remains a student and it is thought that few would deny that a lawyer, before he starts to specialise, must have a good general knowledge of the law and practice. It seems likely, therefore, that the young lawyer of the future will be required to undergo a period of restricted practice after qualification. (To be continued) 122

use is likely to increase and therefore traffic ac cident cases as well as actions for industrial in juries are likely to continue to increase also. There must, therefore, be a continuing and increasing demand for men and women capable of con ducting litigation and of acting as advocates. As regards non-contentious business, the prob ability seems to be that far less time will be devoted to the transfer of property and much greater importance will be attached to a know ledge of commercial and company law and prac tice and especially of revenue law. For economic reasons, as well as because of the public need for greater expertise from the profession and speed of execution, lawyers in general practice will have to specialise to a much greater extent than at present. Even now, indeed, it is doubtful whether any one lawyer should properly hold himself out as being prepared to advise on the whole of the law. Certainly for a lawyer with a general practice in a wide variety of subjects, it must be completely uneconomic to endeavour to acquire that expertise in some new subject, which his client has a right to expect him to possess, sufficient to enable him fairly to com pete with a firm on the other side in which some partner practises almost exclusively in that par ticular subject. The days of the single practitioner, therefore, except in the more remote districts, appear to be numbered and in England there is already a steady decline in the number of solicitors practis ing alone. The existence of a separate Bar cer tainly assists the one-man practitioner, by en abling him to obtain expert advice, but this must be more costly from the client's point of view and is inevitably slower. The most valuable public service has been sup plied for generations by the family lawyer who has been familiar with his client's family, history and private affairs. He has been able to give wise guidance by reason of his background know ledge of the family as a whole. So, the need today of the public is emerging for lawyers in general practice (as is certainly so in the case of those engaged in commerce and industry) to acquire a good working knowledge of their clients' business affairs, if their advice is to be of maximum benefit. Time simply will not permit of this if the lawyer is endeavouring to practise in many fields of law at the same time and there are the clearest signs of increased specialisation. As regards the 'set up' of law offices, the likeli hood appears to be that, for reasons of status among others, legally unqualified clerks upon