The bells are ringing, the trumpets are sounding, the medals are being awarded: a great victory has been achieved. This week, the European Commission finally agreed to establish the equivalent of a European justice ministry, a DG (Directorate General) Justice.The campaign followed predictable steps, with hindsight at any rate. We made the first calls for it in 2003, being brushed off by incomprehension and refusals. I made a speech on the topic exactly two years ago to an assembled crowd of Eurocrats, and my arguments were dismissed point-by-point by the director general of the combined DG of justice and home affairs. We begged president Barroso to pay heed to our arguments, but he didn’t. Then he split the justice and home affairs political portfolios at the end of last year, but insisted on keeping a single department to serve them both. This week, reason prevailed, and a separate DG Justice was created. Of course, without anyone from the commission saying so publicly, our arguments have now been accepted as the only natural way of proceeding.

Lawyers’ professional concerns were previously swallowed up in a department which considered security and immigration to be among the most important challenges facing Europe, causing justice to be sidelined. Of course, terrorism and immigration are both very important. But where did that leave our issues, dwarfed in that company of giants? The argument goes that it is better that security and justice are in the same department because those proposing stronger security measures should always have in mind the needs of justice. But – forgive the extreme metaphor – that is like saying a thief should decide his own case, since the defendant’s case also needs to be considered. We found that justice concerns were not being taken sufficiently into account.

Now, with a department focusing on justice alone, things are definitely improving. For instance, collective redress was previously dealt with by two different DGs altogether – Competition and Consumer Protection. Now DG Justice has joined the group effort responsible for it. But there are still issues lying outside its jurisdiction. I will give two examples.

The first relates to legal expenses insurance. I have previously written about the Eschig case (C-199/08), which decided that, even in mass torts cases, claimants have the right to their own lawyer, and not to a lawyer chosen by the insurance company. The legal expenses industry was not happy with the outcome of that case, as was evident by correspondence in the Gazette after my article appeared. Not unnaturally, the industry is now lobbying the EC. We hear that the commission is thinking of issuing a communication next year on how to interpret Eschig. The communication is likely to give guidance on the question of whether an insured person should benefit from the free choice of lawyer already at the stage of legal advice, or only at the stage of representation in court or before an administrative body. There is obviously a vast difference between the two. The commission is currently collecting data from the insurance industry, and would be interested to receive similar data from lawyers. In my view, it is unusual for the commission to issue guidance after a European Court of Justice case has clearly stated its view.

The areas being probed by the EC show the hand of the insurance industry behind them: are legal costs higher when the insured has a freely chosen lawyer? Do cases take longer when there is freely chosen lawyer? Yet the free choice of lawyer is one of a citizen’s key rights. I think we all agree that it should not be decided by the insurance industry. It is a fundamental matter of justice, and yet it is being dealt with in DG Internal Market. DG Justice was interested to hear about it from us. I doubt that, when justice issues were more scattered around the DGs, they would have cared so much. That is better.

We have also brought to their attention the forthcoming evaluation of the Establishment Directive (98/5/EC), which gives cross-border practice rights to lawyers. This is to be conducted by DG Internal Market, too. It is more properly an internal market matter, since the Establishment Directive is part of the free movement provisions. But the evaluation may turn out to cause a rather large and controversial debate about lawyers’ services, and so DG Justice needs to be a part of it. Again, DG Justice is interested in the topic.

But never mind the current omissions from their portfolio. Celebrations are clearly appropriate this week. Break open the champers!

Jonathan Goldsmith is the Secretary General of the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE), which represents over 700,000 European lawyers through its member bars and law societies