The Bar Association of NSW passed a resolution condemning all forms of sexual harassment, sex discrimination and sexist behaviour of any kind. The ACT Law Society and the Law Institute of Victoria is currently considering amendments to their conduct rules. The Law Society of Western Australia has acknowledged that sexual harassment is a breach of their professional conduct rules and has debated a specific professional conduct rule. The rule, like all of our professional conduct rules will serve to guide the conduct of practitioners to promote a better profession and better practice. It will assist in our education and allow us to serve the community free of discriminatory practices, practices that will one day be eradicated not only from our profession and from the community as a whole.
SEX discrimination is unlawful.
These laws have existed since the mid-1970s. There is nothing new in saying that lawyers should not be engaging in this kind of conduct. It is astonishing that it has taken the legal profession so long to acknowledge the problem in a formal way. There is no room for debate about whether sex discrimination, sexual harassment and discrimination on other grounds occur within the legal profession. The debate, as we see it, is about the Law Society's responsibility to eliminate discriminatory practices within the profession.