The Gazette 1967/71

specific request to refer to a particular firm to you for investigation, and, because their name has occurred in so many cases of complaint to me in the past, I have decided to comply with the request exceptionally." Mr. Freeson then set out details of a com plaint made by a constituent, Mr. J. H. Gold, of Brondesbury, London. Mr. Norman Beach said that he had been a solicitor since 1935. He described the letter as "baseless, wild and reckless," and said that at no time had he received any complaint from Mr. Freeson about the firm's conduct. His brother, Mr. Cyril Beach, said in evidence that he felt the function of an M.P. was to engage in Parliamentary activities. "Frequently an M.P. decides to hold a constituency surgery for the purpose of giving advice. The purpose of the surgery is the same as kissing babies at election time—merely to ensure success at the next election," he said. Eventually it was held that the M.P.'s letter to the Law Society and the Lord Chancellor did not libel a London firm by Mr. Justice Geoffrey Lane. He gave judgment for Mr. Reginald Freeson, M.P., afer a four-day action in which two brothers, Norman and Cyril Beach, who practise as Beach and Beach of Cricklewood, Broadway, London, claimed damages for libel in the letter which they alleged was written with malice. The solicitors were ordered to pay costs estimated at £4,000. Mr. Freeson's letter told of alleged complaints against the solicitors by a number of Mr. Freeson's constituents for whom they had acted. The judge held that the letter was not actuated by malice and, in any event, was covered by "qualified privilege." "It would be a sad day," he said, "when a Member of Parliament or indeed any other mem ber of the public has to look over his shoulder before ventilating to the proper authority criticism about the work of a public servant or a professional man who is holding himself out in practice, for the benefit of the public, which he honestly believes to merit investigation." In the letter to the Law Society, of which a

copy was sent the Lord Chancellor, Mr. Freeson had then set out details of a complaint made by a constituent, Mr. J. H. Gold. Mr. Freeson added in his letter: "I want to underline that this is not the only case where constituents have complained of the conduct of the firm concerned, and the conduct of other firms has been similarly queried and criticised, although none so often as this one. "There are people all over the country who are suffering at the hands of a minority of certain solicitors and I hope that this complaint can be fully investigated by your society." The solicitors had contended, said the judge, that there was no duty, social, moral or legal, upon Mr. Freeson to write to the Law Society in the way he did. But there was no doubt that in recent years there had been a remarkable in crease in the amount of work done by M.P.s outside the House on behalf of constituents. "The reasons are not altogether clear—possibly it is that the private individual feels increasingly that he is at the mercy of huge amorphous and un feeling organisations who will pay no attention to his feeble cries unless they are amplified by someone in authority. An M.P. in these circum stances is an obvious ally to whom to turn." It was a short step from that to hold that in general an M.P. had both an interest and a duty to communicate to the proper body, at the request of a constituent, any substantial complaint abput a professional man in practice. As a Minister of the Crown charged with the responsibility of ensuring that the machinery of justice ran smoothly, it was idle to suggest, said the judge, that the Lord Chancellor had no interest in the fact that an MP. was making a complaint about a solicitor to the Law Society. The copy of the letter which was sent to him was also protected by qualified privilege. The crux of the solicitor's case on malice was that Mr. Freeson had "deliberately lied" about other complaints. Said the judge: "He genuinely believed that these complaints had substance, and I do not subscribe to the view that he deliberately set out to lie to the Law Society and the Lord Chancellor. I exonerate him from that suggestion." : (The Daily Telegraph, llth February, 1970). 204 to