LAWYER IN THE NEWS

Who? Geoffrey Bindman, 68-year-old senior partner of 15-partner London-based firm Bindman & Partners, chairman of the Society of Labour Lawyers and visiting Professor of...Who? Geoffrey Bindman, 68-year-old senior partner of 15-partner London-based firm Bindman & Partners, chairman of the Society of Labour Lawyers and visiting Professor of Law at University College London.Why is he in the news? Represents Keith Vaz, embattled minister for Europe, who was last week cleared of all but one minor charge of wrongdoing by the Parliamentary Committee on Standards and Privileges.

Background: Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Civil Law at Oxford from 1952-56, followed by Law Society finals at the precursor of the London College of Law and a teachingfellowship at Northwestern University, Illinois.

He qualified with Rowley Ashworth in 1959, and set up Shurman & Bindman with Lawrence Shurman in 1961.

After eight years as a partner at trade union firm Lawfords (1965-74), he set up Bindman & Partners in 1974.

The firm has acted for high-profile clients including Clive Ponting, Winston Silcott, and Amnesty International in the General Pinochet case, and in relation to the Pergau Dam in Malaysia.

Mr Bindman received a special award for lifetime human rights achievement from the Gazette and Liberty in 1999 and an honourary doctorate from De Montfort University in July 2000.

Route to the case: Over the years, I have acted for many MPs and ministers, mostly although not always Labour, and I was consulted by Mr Vaz in April of last year.Thoughts on the case: There were 24 separate allegations made against Mr Vaz, and none (bar the most minor) has been upheld.

An investigation on this scale would be virtually impossible to handle without legal help.

What I find very hard to understand is why the media has been so hostile, and why it has, in so many cases, pursued utterly false allegations.

A certain amount of the hostility has I am sure been orchestrated because Mr Vaz has opponents, as any politician does, both within and outside his own party.Dealing with the media: Mr Vaz is obviously very relieved by his exoneration, but this is tinged with a real sadness that so many journalists seem unwilling to accept the carefully considered verdict.

Some even, shockingly, in the serious broadsheets evidently prefer smear and innuendo to evidence.

This is why lawyers are needed: to inject reason and fairness into a media circus.Victoria MacCallum