Picking up the pieces

The solicitors pro bono group is spearheading the massive legal response to the tsunami disaster. Grania Langdon-down charts how legal disaster relief has evolved since 11 September 2001


The devastation wreaked by the tsunami in south-east Asia on Boxing Day prompted an immediate, visceral response among lawyers to help in as many ways as possible.


Many firms have raised money, often with partners matching staff’s efforts pound for pound. But with lessons learned from the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks in New York, the Solicitors Pro Bono Group (SPBG) is determined to focus and co-ordinate the legal response as effectively as possible.


From last week, volunteer lawyers – from paralegals to partners – have been manning a helpline (tel: 020 7090 7363) at the SPBG’s London office for any British nationals or their families who have been caught up in the disaster and need legal advice. While more than 50 Britons have so far been confirmed dead, another 200 are ‘highly likely’ to have been caught up in the disaster, according to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). A further 346 remain unaccounted for. Hundreds more were injured or lost possessions.



SPBG chief executive Sue Bucknall explains: ‘After 9/11, it was the Foreign Office which got in touch with us and asked what we could do. The response was very ad hoc as we were only a tiny charity with three staff. We couldn’t do anything ourselves so we put the FCO’s request out to firms and that was the end of our involvement.



‘This time, we decided to take the bull by the horns and be prepared when problems started to arise. We now have a staff of eight, so we can take on bigger projects and, knowing what happened in 2001, we realised very early on that we needed to put systems in place to co-ordinate the widespread offers of help we have been receiving from lawyers.’


This has included a team of 20 volunteers from Mishcon de Reya to man the helpline. Anthony Morton-Hooper, litigation partner with the 42-partner central London practice, says that, despite the firm’s relatively small size, staff wanted to do something tangible to help in addition to fund-raising.


The helpline number has been included on the FCO’s Web site. When someone rings, the lawyer will take basic details such as name and contact numbers, the name of their insurance company to avoid any conflict issues later on if it turns out the law firm helping the caller acts for their insurance company, and a brief outline of the problem.



The information will then be put on a private area of the group’s specially created Web site (www.tsunamilegalhelp.org.uk). Volunteer law firms and their lawyers will have user names and passwords. They will be notified by e-mail when a case has been put up on the site.



The group’s LawWorks project manager, Graham Bucknall, explains: ‘We have a list of more than 100 volunteers but some are representatives of firms, so we have access to probably thousands of lawyers. We have more than enough volunteers to avoid any problems over conflict. We will also be acting as a central point for the exchange of information on common problems, so if a firm researches an issue, it can let us have the result to e-mail it out to the rest of the distribution list.’


It is too early to judge how many people will use the helpline. But Mr Bucknall says: ‘We have decided that, because there could be large numbers, we are not going to do our normal financial checks on callers. We don’t have the staff to do it so there will be no financial criteria for submitting requests for help on to the Web site. It will be up to firms taking on a case to decide how to proceed on an individual basis.’


Ms Bucknall says: ‘We don’t want to hold things up for people who may be in a desperate situation. I also don’t want to put people off from phoning us by asking “how much money have you got?” Of course there is a danger of fraud and we must be alert to that, which is why we will keep records. We run a risk – but that is inevitable.’


She says the first phase of the response is to offer help to British nationals. ‘But, in the longer term, there will be issues about rebuilding the countries and helping local businesses and people, and we are beginning to gather together practitioners who are willing to be involved in a sort of VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) for lawyers.’


Among the immediate problems facing people here who have lost loved ones will be those whose bodies may never be found. The government has said that, because of the ‘exceptional circumstances’ created by the tsunami, their families will be able to obtain death certificates under a new procedure rather than have to wait the usual seven years. This follows similar measures adopted in the US after the 11 September attacks, where the authorities set up a special court to issue death certificates because the bodies of so many of those who died were never found.


The FCO has said it is likely to be ‘months rather than weeks’ before the first certificates are issued, to allow for bodies to be identified in Thailand and the other affected countries. The four tests required by police for a death certificate may throw up problems. These are the existence of evidence beyond reasonable doubt that the person concerned had travelled to the affected region; that on the balance of probability they were in the area at the time the tsunami struck; there is no reasonable evidence of life since 26 December; and there is no reason on the balance of probability to believe that the person should want to disappear.


Other immediate legal problems that are going to arise are likely to involve travel and life insurance – though insurance companies have said they will pay tsunami victims’ life policies on the basis of a ‘reasonable evidence’ test where there is no body – employment, family, mortgages, pension plans, as well as issues over wills and probate.


Yasmin Waljee, pro bono manager for top-ten City firm Lovells, says: ‘In the longer term, firms will be looking to apply their expertise in terms of both project finance work and micro finance work – for instance, looking at how a fund could be established to provide small loans for people on the ground to re-build their livelihoods.’


But she stresses that the pro bono response should not be seen as a PR exercise for City law firms. ‘The profession as a whole has reacted to the disaster with fund-raising schemes.’ However, she and the other firm-based pro bono co-ordinators say it is critical to expand the number of volunteers beyond the obvious large practices.


‘The SPBG needs to be able to offer the widest possible skill-set. The police have said eight different forces are involved, which means we also need a spread of lawyers across the country,’ Ms Waljee says.


That need was highlighted after the 11 September attacks when the London office of US firm White & Case was asked to help some British families, including a couple whose son was among the 2,800 killed in the World Trade Centre. Felicity Kirk, the firm’s director of pro bono, says: ‘I acted as a conduit for some British families to make the process as seamless as possible.


‘We don’t have a private client department here so when some probate work was needed, I found a small firm – Collins Solicitors in Watford – which was prepared to do it pro bono and they were excellent.


‘The families also came into our offices and we arranged conference calls to New York and found them US lawyers to help with compensation claims. We also helped set up foundations and small charities as memorials to those who died.’


Amanda Clark, a solicitor with Collins Solicitors, says it helped one couple with the paperwork necessary to release pension monies and other assets through their son’s company. She says it was pleased to help but stresses that many small firms are now too stretched to volunteer.


While smaller and medium-sized firms may have the expertise to help in areas such as probate, which some of the big firms do not, the major international firms have the capacity to respond to the tsunami disaster as an enduring exercise in pro bono work.


Florence Campbell, pro bono officer for magic circle firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer , says the response to her request for volunteers was ‘overwhelming’, adding: ‘Luckily, we didn’t lose anyone in the disaster but, like 9/11, everyone knows someone who was involved and they are fired up to help. Pro bono work is among the most professionally rewarding work you can do and hopefully we will recruit some long-term pro bono lawyers out of this.’


Michael Smyth, pro bono partner with fellow international giant Clifford Chance, says his firm was also fortunate that with a staff of more than 5,000 and an office in Bangkok, it did not lose anyone in the disaster. However, the tragedy struck a chord with staff. ‘What was most impressive was that the fund-raising activity that took place in the days immediately after the disaster struck was the result of colleagues using their own initiative. In terms of our community programme going forward, I am obviously anxious to build on that.


‘You still occasionally hear the comment that in a firm like mine there is no scope for, say, a projects lawyer to do work relevant to that area of expertise on a pro bono basis. In fact, the implications of such a catastrophe are so wide-ranging that projects support is precisely the kind of help that may be needed in the months to come.’


However, Mr Smyth adds: ‘There remains a balance to be struck between the provision of immediate humanitarian support, which will always be vital, and the need to help over the longer term. The Prime Minister made the point that disease in effect creates a tsunami in Africa every day. Lawyers tend by disposition to be quite strategic and perhaps firms like mine need to recalibrate their commitment a bit towards legal work on prevention.


‘In my position as pro bono partner, I see that debate coming to the fore and I anticipate that over the next year we will see firms wanting to have smaller but deeper relationships with agencies that are planning for the long term. That would certainly be my wish.’


For US lawyers, the 11 September attacks proved a defining moment for the profession. More than 4,000 individuals and families affected by the attacks were represented on a pro bono basis by lawyers, who volunteered in their thousands.



According to the recent report Public Service in a Time of Crisis, which looks back over the legal community’s response to 11 September, about 3,000 lawyers received training through the New York City Bar and in-house law firm programmes. More than 800 lawyers trained as ‘facilitators’, looking after clients, prioritising their needs, and finding the specialist help they needed.



The report identifies 18 lessons for the future, including the vital need for training, pointing out the response to the attacks ‘shattered’ the myth that only lawyers with particular skills are able to provide free services. ‘Not only were litigators able to participate, but every speciality joined in, often providing services in relatively unfamiliar legal areas.’ The report also says that, to maximise their effectiveness, lawyers must be seen as an integral part of a community’s emergency response team and so they must build relationships with social service and disaster response agencies.


Glyn Lobo is co-chairman of the pro bono committee at the New York office of US/UK firm Dechert, where he headed its 11 September relief efforts. ‘A lot of us had specialities which were not needed in this situation but we were given enough training so we could perform a basic legal triage function.

‘Representations have lasted a long time. I am a mergers and acquisitions transactional lawyer, and I have not had a client relationship as personal or as intense as those after 11 September. I think the events had a galvanising effect on lawyers and changed the way they regarded their own skills. Many of those who became involved in the pro bono work hadn’t done it before because they were too busy, but many have continued to do it because they now realise how worthwhile and extremely important it is.’

He says lawyers in New York are marshalling funds for the tsunami victims. Like Mr Smyth, he hopes the World Trade Centre attacks and the latest disaster will lead to long-term changes in the way firms provide pro bono help.


Mr Lobo adds: ‘It is unfortunate that hundreds of thousands of people need to die in a single moment for people to realise there is suffering and devastation happening on a daily basis in overlooked corners of the globe, particularly Sudan.


‘But it is a human characteristic to revert to old behaviour patterns once something leaves our moment of recognition. I think 11 September has had a lasting effect on our city and its lawyers, and the tsunami will have a singular, searing affect on many people. But whether it changes behaviour long term – I can only hope.’


Grania Langdon-Down is a freelance journalist