Free thinkers unite

Glances are shot across the pond where lawyers aim to provide 50 pro bono hours a year.

Linda Tsang reflects on what law firms in the Uk are doing to promote this type of work

Pro bono is for the good of the public and also, in an oblique way, a means of making lawyers feel good about themselves.

But pro bono is also something of a political football, both within the profession and in terms of how the government deals with it.

Last month, the Law Society council rejected a proposal to set an 'aspirational' pro bono target of 40 hours a year for every solicitor.

President Michael Napier said the council had clearly reiterated its support for pro bono work, and of the Solicitors Pro Bono Group (SPBG), but added: 'Many council members believe that it should remain a personal commitment, and a target would be counter-productive.'

But there are also wider implications about pro bono work, and how - and why - it is being done.

At the same meeting, council member John Holder raised the issue of 'the message we are sending to the government, the Community Legal Service, and the Lord Chancellor's Department'.

He added that doing pro bono was 'not necessarily something we should be proud of.

We all do it but some of it is because we haven't been able to stand up to the government's salami-slicing away of legal aid, which means our clients cannot get the help they need and we can't see them suffer.

'It is not a good message to send to the government and those bodies - if they squeeze us till the pips squeak then we will do it for free.'

In the event, the council encouraged the SPBG to apply for a 50,000 grant from the Law Society charity, to be used for pilot referral networks, and also approved the training committee's view that proper, work-related pro bono activity should count as part of training contracts.

The Society will also sponsor a pro bono champion award, and will draw up a scheme similar to the American Bar Association's pro bono challenge, which started in Washington DC about 10 years ago.

It challenged law firms to commit between 3% and 5% of profits to pro bono work.

Peta Sweet, founding director of the SPBG from 1997 to 2000, comments that: 'Other countries' attitudes to pro bono provide valuable models.

A key lesson from other professional bodies and leading lawyers, particularly in the US, [where lawyers aspire to provide 50 pro bono hours a year], was the need for leadership at the top of the profession.

Another important point was recognition that pro bono work is not about charity or altruism but is a professional responsibility.' She adds that 'the fact that this is a difficult issue is no excuse - it has been confronted elsewhere.

Importantly, the profession stands to be accused of shallow rhetoric without actually demonstrating a commitment to access to justice.'

Sue Bucknall, the current director of the SPBG, says she was disappointed by the council's decision, and also surprised because 'the decision does not reflect the reality of what is actually out there.

We did not think that an aspirational voluntary target of 40 hours was asking too much - in the US, they all do it'.

Ms Bucknall adds, on the positive side, that there are other initiatives.

LawWorks, which was set up with the Law Centres Foundation, acts as a brokerage to match lawyers to law centres and has been a success in its initial stages, while the SPBG is also working on a student challenge, inviting students to come up with an original pro bono project that can make a difference, with a prize of 1,000 and work experience at City firm Clyde & Co.

The SPBG has also had its first US law firm join - top Wall Street practice Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom.

And with the SPBG and Bar Pro Bono Unit conference in March 2001, there are plans to launch LawWorks for community groups, which is aimed at widening pro bono work from individuals to groups, and also at bringing in in-house lawyers to do corporate work.

She says 'the potential for LawWorks for community groups is huge - in New York, lawyers provided more than $1 million of legal advice and that has been going on for years.

This will be the first country outside of the US to launch a similar initiative.'

Money is inevitably one of the problems.

Ms Bucknall says the SPBG charity operates on funding of about 100,000, with 45,000 from the Law Society, but its job is to motivate lawyers at all levels in the profession.

She acknowledges that many firms and lawyers do pro bono work outside the SPBG umbrella, but argues that membership gives access to networks and training, and can cut down on duplication and waste, as well as focusing resources.

She adds: 'With the student challenge, it is to get lawyers into the habit of pro bono at an early stage.' In a similar vein, the College of Law is setting up advice clinics in its branches staffed by law students.

The younger end of the profession has already seen a number of initiatives.

Leeds-based Eversheds solicitor Mark Dillon, chairman of the Young Solicitors Group, credits his predecessor, Sara Chandler, with introducing the group's pro bono awards, sponsored by the Gazette.

He says: 'It is essentially going back to basics, and it is one of the roles of pro bono that it is a form of "reputation enhancement" for the profession.

But despite the publicity that the big commercial firms get in this area - including winning awards - pro bono is about much more than that.

The next stage of the YSG pro bono awards is to go out to the regions, and have separate awards for the different regions to recognise the work that is done there.'

Mr Dillon acknowledges that there are political sensitivities involved in pro bono, in terms of the work that high-street practices already do.

'Pro bono and voluntary legal work is clearly a complex area, and that overlaps with the legal aid debate, and the difficulties that legal aid firms are having in gaining or retaining franchises - they already have close links with the community.

The last thing they want to hear is that they are not doing enough pro bono work.

And no one wants to see the well-intentioned good offices of firms and lawyers being used as an excuse for justifying removal of legal aid funding.'

He adds that in practical terms, a commitment to pro bono has wider, intangible results, including greater job satisfaction and retention of lawyers who get involved in community-based initiatives.

Mr Dillon says: 'Even if they are not dealing with that kind of client in their front-line work, when they get involved in working in law centres, they feel that they are putting something back.'

For the larger firms that have been appointing pro bono officers and co-ordinators, that is seen as one way of generating positive publicity.

The more cynical have pointed out that despite the number of hours given to pro bono, some firms may play that down for fear of putting off clients.

It is feared that while clients might approve of the principle of pro bono, they might also be concerned that it would distract their lawyers from their own matters.But Mr Dillon says the evidence points the other way, and one company which has led the way by telling its professional advisers to follow its example in committing time and effort to pro bono is BAe - the first company to obtain Law Society approval for an in-house team to undertake pro bono projects.

In-house counsel Terence Black says: 'We want law firms whose values are aligned to our values - firms that think the way we do.

If the firms are active in the pro bono policy they will be more likely to be able to help out to develop projects and work with us.' Mr Black says that when BAe asked firms to say how much pro bono work they did, almost all said they were doing something, but did not identify it as being of any value to the firm.

And more firms are becoming more organised in how they do pro bono work.

DLA, one of the founding members of the SPBG, is the first national firm to appoint a pro bono co-ordinator, after a handful of top City firms started the trend.

Elaine Radford was appointed in July, and is based in the City.

She sees her role as that of a facilitator, across all of the firm's offices.

Mrs Radford says: 'One tier of pro bono work is in providing legal advice to the Prince's Trust, but there are also the community-based projects, such as mentoring children in east London, being involved in the Leeds Cares projects, and also the pro bono initiatives which were first set up by the Manchester office.

The firm is also involved in various partnerships which are involved in inner-city regeneration.' She adds: 'The marketplace dictates the modus operandi - it can be seen as touchy-feely, but it is also about corporate social responsibility - you can't operate without it.'

And it is not just the private sector that has realised that pro bono work has to be better organised.

John Evans is chairman of the Government Legal Service Pro Bono Network, which was launched in early October with more than 70 lawyers.

He says the lawyers had been doing pro bono work for years, but it had not been co-ordinated.

'One important objective is in relation to training: we recently had two Office of Fair Trading lawyers host a session on consumer law, which was attended by more than 100 lawyers from private practice.

We are also organising sessions on human rights and European law, as well as linking up with other organisations to provide volunteers - after all, 2001 is the United Nations year of the volunteer.'

As for the future in the wider sense, Tony Willis, chairman of the board of trustees of SPBG and a consultant at Clifford Chance, says: 'There is still a long way to go, but we have come some distance already; the recent council debate is a measure of that.' As to what counts as success, he concedes that 'it may be that the SPBG may do itself out of its job, but you still need a level of co-ordination'.

But others are more pragmatic.

Mr Dillon concludes: 'The real challenge for the future is genuinely meeting unmet needs.

You can't be too fussy about motives - it is what works and what makes a difference.'

Linda Tsang is a freelance journalist