44% of citizen lawyers actually practice the profession

A parliamentary report calling on “Al-Adl” to set a regulation to regulate “attorneys’ fees ”in the country

Al-Watani approved a report on the efforts of the Ministry of Justice to develop the legal profession.

From the source

In a report it approved last Tuesday, the Federal National Council suggested on “the efforts of the Ministry of Justice in the matter of developing the legal profession” that the Ministry of Justice should adopt the drafting and elaboration of a unified regulation to regulate attorneys ’fees in the country, similar to a number of other countries, to avoid disputes between lawyers and their clients. The report criticized what it described as the "growing phenomenon of shadow attorneys" in the country, stressing that only 44% of citizen lawyers actually practice the profession.

In detail, the Federal National Council agreed, during its session held last Tuesday, under the chairmanship of the Council's Chairman, Saqr Ghobash, on a report by the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs and Appeals Committee of the Council, on the topic of “The Ministry of Justice’s Efforts in Developing the Legal Profession”, which was prepared by the committee according to three main axes, It included "the policy of the Ministry of Justice regarding the services provided to lawyers and the obligations they entail, and the challenges facing the work of lawyers in the country, in addition to the ministry's efforts to develop the Judicial Training Institute."

According to the final report, the committee concluded 14 parliamentary notes, including seven remarks on the topic of “The Policy of the Ministry of Justice in the matter of services provided to lawyers and their obligations.” The first is the multiplicity of bodies that issue the lawyer registration card in the country to include the Ministry of Justice, the Judicial Department in Abu Dhabi, and courts. Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah Courts, which resulted in the difficulty of issuing the registration card and the length of time that it takes for the lawyer to obtain the registration card, in addition to the high fees for issuing the registration card for the lawyers.

The report stated that the committee also noticed the growth of the phenomenon of "shadow lawyer", which allows (according to the committee) the control of a foreign lawyer over the legal profession, while the owner of the national law firm does not know anything about the office's work before the judicial authorities, calling on the ministry to activate the supervisory role over the legal profession. Lawyers' offices.

The third observation was that there are no clear restrictions on opening law firms for new lawyers, such as administrative and legal experience that requires three years of experience to avoid administrative, professional and legal problems. The committee also noted the absence of social and health initiatives for lawyers, such as the absence of health insurance and a social solidarity fund to protect them from Risks related to the profession and affecting them in the event of crises and disasters, as well as the difficulty of attorneys obtaining bank financing from banks because the legal profession is considered a high-risk free profession, which is difficult to grant financing loans, which affects the activity of the law firm’s expansion, and denies the lawyer obtaining personal loans to meet his needs. And his personal requirements.

The report mentioned in the sixth note, that the weakness of communication channels between the Ministry of Justice and lawyers resulted in the lawyers ’lack of awareness of new or updated legislation and laws, which affected the practice of the profession before state courts, while the last note spoke of the absence of initiatives that contribute to raising the rate of resettlement of lawyers, especially in International investment companies and institutions or in foreign legal advice offices in free zones, which resulted in the withdrawal of a number of local lawyers to the non-working list, as their percentage reached 56% compared to the percentage of working lawyers, which amounted to 44% of the total number of citizen lawyers.

According to the report, the parliamentary report included five observations by the members of the committee in the topic "Challenges facing the work of lawyers in the country", as the committee concluded that the ban imposed on the attorney from carrying out any commercial activity coincides with his practice of the legal profession in accordance with Federal Law No. (23) of 1999 regarding Organizing the legal profession resulted in the difficulty of obtaining additional income for the lawyer to achieve a decent life for him and his family, while the committee criticized in another note “the absence of a regulation for organizing fees for the legal profession compared to a number of countries, in order to avoid disputes between lawyers and their clients, and I also noticed the difficulty of lawyers’ participation in the Commission. General Pensions and Social Security due to the difficulty in meeting their requirements, which negatively affects lawyers in obtaining social security and pensions that achieve social security for them and their families.

The list of the five parliamentary notes in this axis included the absence of a regulation that organizes the tasks of each entity competing for the legal profession, such as legal consulting offices, debt collection offices, administrative consulting offices and legal translation offices, which led to damage to lawyers ’income due to clients’ reluctance from law firms and their orientation towards competing offices. Such as the Aide offices and agree.

Finally, the committee noted the restriction of judicial delegation in state courts, pointing out that although Article (36) of Federal Law No. (23) of 1999 regulating the legal profession regulated the process of judicial delegation, in practice the courts require the original lawyer to attend a hearing The court does not accept the assignment issued by him to his lawyer colleague after (8) assignments in one case, which leads to canceling or delaying the progress of many cases.

Similarity of study programs

The report stated that the focus of “the ministry’s efforts in developing the Judicial Training Institute” included three parliamentary remarks. The first is the similarity of the study programs offered by the Judicial Institute with the subjects previously studied by the associate at the university, which leads to poor outputs of the Institute for Training and Judicial Studies.

The second is the absence of continuous training for working lawyers, which resulted in the lawyers not keeping up with the legal developments in the country, and this is due to the lack of an obligation in the law law for lawyers to attend seminars and specialized conferences while practicing the profession, and finally the lack of harmony and coordination between the Ministry of Justice and the Judicial Institute in training lawyers Trainees, which led to the absence of scheduling their training and their follow-up in law offices.

• Poor communication between "justice" and lawyers resulting in their lack of awareness of the new legislation.

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