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Introduction to part 4

THIS PART EXAMINES IMPEDIMENTS to women’s access to the justice

system, arising from the regulation and delivery of legal services by lawyers in private practice, which will not be overcome by the law reform and other initiatives recommended in chapters 6 and 7.

Five systemic defects in the delivery of private lawyers’ services are identified, namely:

• inadequate and poorly co-ordinated information about lawyers, which hinders women’s choice of lawyers and their informed participation in the justice system;

• inadequate diversity in the legal profession, which operates to inhibit women’s choice of lawyers, service quality and the promotion of equality through the law;

• an insufficiently user-focused approach, which results in a lack of diversity in service delivery to women, particularly with regard to

– the use of written materials to publicise legal information,

– the languages of lawyers and legal resources,

– clients with caregiving responsibilities,

– clients with mobility or disability needs, and

– lawyers’ inter-personal communication skills;

• the lack of a transparent, effective means of ensuring lawyers’ accountability to their clients, which results in women’s concerns about fee information and informed participation in the management of their cases not being addressed; and

• inadequate and unco-ordinated efforts to train and educate lawyers about the effects of gender, which prevent women’s needs for responsive legal services and for the promotion of equality by means of the law from being understood by all lawyers.

From the principles and process identified as essential to promote the just treatment of women by the justice system, five key strategies are identified to remedy these defects, namely:

• increased diversity in the publication and co-ordination of information about lawyers’ services;

• increased diversity in the legal profession;

• increased diversity in the manner in which lawyers provide services;

• transparency in the method of ensuring the accountability of lawyers to their clients; and

• an enhanced focus on the significance of gender in the training and education of all those seeking to practise as lawyers.

The next four chapters explore these strategies in detail. Chapter 8 examines the issue of choice among private lawyers. Chapter 9 examines the diversity of service provision by private lawyers. Chapter 10 examines aspects of the accountability of lawyers to their clients. Chapter 11 examines aspects of the formal legal education and training of law students and lawyers.