Lawyers should receive training in professional ethics throughout their careers, peers have concluded after a wide-ranging inquiry into threats to the rule of law in the UK. In its report Rule of law: holding the line between anarchy and tyranny, the House of Lords constitution committee, states that 'trust in the legal profession has been undermined by high-profile examples of unethical practice'.
This distrust, accelerated by 'negative rhetoric in the media and by politiicians' and exacerbated by 'massive inequalities and lack of access to legal advice', undermines respect for the rule of law. The report cites the Post Office Horizon scandal and Legal Services Board research showing 'a lack of understanding and/or due regard to the significance of what upholding professional ethical duties means in practice'.
To restore public trust, the committee recommends that the ethical training of lawyers should be reviewed and strengthened by professional bodies. 'Lawyers should receive dedicated ethical training throught their career'.
The report follows a nine-month inquiry in which the committee took evidence from the most senior judiciary as well as professional bodies, regulators, academics, journalists and then lord chancellor Shabana Mahmood. Among its other recommendations is a call for the government to take 'decisive action to tackle delays in the courts', better education about the rule of law in schools and an end to personal attacks on judges.
It concludes: 'Everyone, but particularly those in public life, needs to be proactive in strengthening our rule of law culture, and this must start now. Failing to do so risks the rise of extremist political parties, growing antipathy towards democracy, and, ultimately creating space for a dictatorship of arbitrary rule.'
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