The Council of the Bars and Law Societies of the European Community (CCBE) has a problem.

It may be the officially recognised voice of Europe's 450,000 lawyers, but few of those lawyers know about it.

And those who do, only know it for its work on the draft EU Rights of Establishment Directive.This is a problem CCBE president Ram--n Mullerat recognises.

'It is true that the CCBE is not sufficiently known,' he admits, without promising to do much about it.

'Perhaps the reason is that the CCBE represents national Bars, not individual members.'The CCBE was formed in 1960 following the signing of the 1957 Treaty of Rome.

It is now made up of delegations from the 15 EU countries and two countries from the European Economic Area, Norway and Iceland.

In addition, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Slovak Republic, Switzerland and Turkey all have observer status.

Poland's application to become an observer will be considered shortly.

Mr Mullerat is the 18th president and the first from Spain.

He took office at the beginning of 1996.The stated principal object of the CCBE is 'to study all questions affecting the legal professions of the member states of the EU and EEA and to formulate solutions designed to co-ordinate and harmonise professional practice'.

In addition to official recognition from the EU as the profession's representative, the CCBE maintains permanent delegations at the EU's European Court of Justice and Court of First Instance, the court at the European Free Trade Association and the European Court of Human Rights.The value of the CCBE, particularly for the UK, can be seen in its work on the Rights of Establishment Directive.

Since taking a formal position at a meeting in Dresden last year, the CCBE has been leading the argument for a liberal regime for EU lawyer s practising in other EU countries.

This was a view championed in Dresden by the UK and Germany, and has been reflected in a crucial report on the Directive to the European Parliament's legal affairs committee, whose decision will probably dictate the Directive's final version.

In Dresden, only France, Spain and Luxembourg voted against.The French in particular are unhappy with the situation and have been causing Mr Mullerat problems.

But the 56-year-old Barcelona-based company lawyer is not one to admit to his problems.

'They are a minority because they are three countries but they represent important countries and a very large number of lawyers.

However, the CCBE sticks to the Dresden position,' he says.

Mr Mullerat keeps strictly to this line in response to concerns that, despite the official CCBE position, continued lobbying by the French profession is confusing the debate and holding up for even longer a much-delayed Directive.He is similarly unforthcoming over the International Bar Association's draft guidelines on foreign legal consultants, which effectively deal with rights of establishment world-wide.

Mr Mullerat calls these guidelines as important as the Directive and says the CCBE will formulate its response to them at its next meeting on 29 March 1996.However, the deadline for comments was 1 March and the IBA did not even know of the delay in the CCBE's reply until contacted by the Gazette last month.

Eventually, the IBA agreed to extend the deadline.

Mr Mullerat resists the suggestion that the CCBE has been irresponsible in risking missing the chance to have its say.

'The countries have different views on the guidelines,' he maintains.

'They are on the agenda for the next standing committee meeting.'Mr Mullerat is far happier describing the other work of the CCBE, arguing that the organisation will not have outlived its usefulness once the Directive finally becomes law.

The number one priority, he says, is training and he is particularly keen to harmonise it.He applauds the recent initiative by the UK, Spain, Germany and Belgium to exchange trainee solicitors and says the CCBE has been asked by the European Commission to assist on the Schuman project to harmonise the teaching of EU law.

The CCBE has also begun to make contacts with the new Association of European Faculties of Law.

'We would like to see if they can produce a more harmonised type of lawyer,' he says.Mr Mullerat is particularly proud of the CCBE's code of conduct for lawyers, which was adopted in 1988 and is used as a model for ethical rules across Europe and, particularly, he says, in central and eastern Europe.

'We believe ethics are the quintessence of the profession,' he asserts.'We believe that lawyers with judges are co-ministers of justice,' he continues.

'Our principal obligation is towards the rule of law.

The next obligation is towards the client and the last is towards our own profit.'If lawyers put their own interests before others, they would cease to be professionals and become businessmen, which is unacceptable.'Given the demands of competition both within the profession and from others -- he opposes restricting entry to the profession and has no problem with accountants getting involved in law as long as they respect lawyers' independence -- Mr Mullerat is focusing on opening new practice areas and reclaiming others, such as tax.As befits a man who constantly has to seek compromise, Mr Mullerat is careful in what he says but his enthusiasm spills over when discussing the legal role of the EU.

This makes him and the CCBE sl ightly more controversial when it comes to the intergovernmental conference in Turin this week.The evidence is the CCBE's manifesto for the conference, which calls for the European courts' jurisdiction to be extended to common foreign and security policy, and justice and home affairs -- subjects he recognises as sensitive in the UK.

Unlike many British politicians, Mr Mullerat believes the ECJ needs to be more, not less, powerful, echoing his overall theme of individual rights and the lawyer's duty to protect them.'I am concerned that the Maastricht Treaty restricted the powers of the ECJ to intervene,' he concludes.

'All these areas affect the fundamental right of the citizen and we need to have a court that is able to protect them.'