Law Society very critical

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33577, 4 July 1974, Page 3

Law Society very critical

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, July 3. The report on court business was criticised today by Mr L. H. Southwick, Q.C., vicepresident of the Law Society.

The society, which repretsented the country’s 30(0 practising lawyers, disagreeo with the report in several places and would say so to the Minister of Justice (Dr Finlay) when he returned from The Hague. In a prepared statement, Mr Southwick said the report largely ignored submissions made by the society and even worse attributed to it views not held by the society. TIME OF CHANGE

“The business of the courts is changing profoundly and rapidly, and any structural changes to

the courts may now be short-term.

“Within two years, a full, independent and representative commission of inquiry — preferably not composed solely of judicial officers, lawyers and Justice .Department officials — may be needed to investigate the whole court system. “The Law Society council was outspokenly critical of the committee’s report at its meeting on June 28,” said Mr Southwick, who was chairman of the meeting in the absence overseas of the president (Mr W. G. Smith). The following points were made.—

The society remained implacably opposed to any “Crown court” system. Tije present right of an accused person to seek trial by jury in the Supreme Court should not be altered unless close study of the principle involved showed this to be desirable. It must not be ' changed merely to relieve pressure on the courts.

Although the society agreed that a person suing for divorce, custody or maintenance should be able to choose either the Supreme Court or the Magistrate’s Court for the hearing, this arrangement must be considered temporary. An obvious step in restructuring the courts would be the creation of smallclaims courts, but the society firmly believed that these should be presided over by lawyers because their training best equipped them for that job. “Such changes, coupled with the decline in accident compensation litigation,- may gradually relieve the - workload of the courts,” said Mr Southwick. ANOTHER JUDGE “In the short term, however, at least one additional Supreme Court judge should be appointed immediately. The Supreme Court should also consider shortening its hearings by using more efficient means of recording

evidence, for example, shorthand reporting or sound recording. At present, proceedings are transcribed direct on to a typewriter.

“The Speight committee’s report largely ignores the submissions of the New Zealand Law Society made in April this year,” Mr Southwick said.

“It quotes extensively from a working paper presented in November, 1973, by a sub-committee of lawyers that emphasised that its views were not those of the society. Many of those views were rejected by the society after thorough investigations that preceded its April submissions.” COMMERCIAL LAW

Mr Southwick said the Law Society urged a full study of possible improvements to court procedures in commercial disputes. Present procedures protracted commercial disputes so much that the business world’s confidence in the court system was being affected.