Little Andrew: Lawyers and Conveyancers Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Little Andrew: Lawyers and Conveyancers Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 13 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6512. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
ANDREW LITTLE (Labour) 
: 
 It is a great pleasure to take a call on the Lawyers and Conveyancers Amendment Bill. What is very clear is that for the sake of a robust democracy and for the sake of the rule of law in a democratic country like ours having a high-standard high-standing professional Bar is absolutely crucial. Having a body of advocates who can take cases whether in the criminal jurisdiction the civil or any other and represent people fearlessly and without favour before Her Majesty’s judges—and before anybody else if they so wish—is absolutely crucial to ensuring that people’s statutory and common law rights are observed and respected and that justice is able to be administered properly and fearlessly. So in that context and with the amount of law that we have—statute law and common law—having a legal profession that is well led and that has men and women of standing substance and intellectual capacity is very important. Having a means by which we recognise those who are excellent performers and top performers in the profession not only gives confidence to those who are dependent on their advocacy and their services but also is important—it is absolutely crucial—to the administration of good justice in the country. So this bill touches upon a very important aspect. 
I agree with my colleagues who have participated in the debate so far that most members of the public would not know what the distinguishing features or factors are between a QC and any other member of the legal profession. When people get into trouble or get into conflict or a dispute they want someone who will represent them. They are not particularly fussed about the letters after their name—except of course when the invoice arrives. Then of course it does become very important. 
I want to say that we have been very well served in this country not just by the legal profession at large but also by the senior advocates within it. We have tended to recognise those senior and outstanding advocates—those who engage in excellent advocacy in the court—by conferring on them this title which was once upon a time QC King’s Counsel before that and more recently SC Senior Counsel. 
In my experience I have come up against and I have dealt with many excellent holders of the QC title. I think of people like Kit Toogood who was outstanding in the employment field and who is now on the bench. I think of someone like Simon Lockhart to whom I juniored in my first ever jury trial who was most influential in education and people like George Barton QC who brought great intellect to the field. I think of women like Kristy McDonald and Denise Bates. More recently I think of Harry Waalkens who cross-examined me at length on behalf of Air New Zealand once. Two days later we settled the case on terms favourable to the union. I think of David Goddard and I must say more recently an outstanding QC in my view Nigel Hampton who represented the Amalgamated Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union and the miners in the Royal Commission on the Pike River Coal Mine Tragedy and who is now representing one of the victims of the Christchurch earthquake and the collapse of the CTV Building. He is a most compassionate humanitarian in his advocacy and in his work and in his community work too. And then of course there is Paul East who is a friend to all of us. But one of the QCs whom I have come across and whom I appeared opposite but whom I expect to have contact with very soon is of course Julian Miles. He is a very good performer in the court and a very good advocate. We will see how he goes of course in proceedings in which I am involved along with my colleague Trevor Mallard and indeed a well-known Cabinet Minister. 
But outstanding as all these representatives are as outstanding as all these counsel are one of the great virtues of the reforms that the last Labour Government led was that they allowed those who had won the respect of the profession and the right to have the title conferred on them of Senior Counsel to be drawn from a much wider berth. I think that was the good thing about it. The truth is that there are outstanding advocates who are not members of the so-called independent Bar. The two points I make about that are that firstly I know because I have dealt with them in the employment field members of the so-called independent Bar are embedded to use a military term in the commercial companies on whose behalf they are acting. They have a letterhead that suggests an independent chambers but when you look closely at the address and when you meet them they are actually at the commercial premises and the head office of the company for whom they are acting. That is one side of the independent Bar. 
The other is that law firms themselves certainly in their senior ranks and the senior partners of law firms produce some frankly top performers. I think of people like Jack Hodder who is a great constitutionalist a great public lawyer and a great partner of a law firm. Then I think of people like Mai Chen as well who similarly is a partner of a law firm but it would be hard to describe her as anything other than totally independent and fearless on whichever side of the fence or the argument that she is advocating. So there is simply no call there is no logic to the argument that reinstating the rank of QC is about preserving the independence of the rank or elevating the independent Bar. It will not do that because the independent Bar stands apart we know who the top performers are and they can be recognised irrespective of where they are in the profession. So it will be disappointing to take that backwards step. 
Then of course the other rationale for this change is that we want to restore in name at least the links to the Crown or to the monarch. Well we have been moving gradually away from that in so many other respects and much as we respect the role that the monarch plays in our constitution the truth is that we have been increasingly independent as a nation—a genuine dominion as we aspired to be at the beginning of last century but genuinely independent and it is disappointing that by reinstating the title QC we are taking that backward step. Notwithstanding that part of it there is no question that there are important ways in which we can recognise those who are at the top of the profession and those who are excellent advocates without having to confer on them some mythical link to the Crown. 
All those QCs those respectable men and women whom I adumbrated just now are people I have met none of whom were representing the Crown when I worked with them appeared opposite them or did whatever. They were acting either in commercial or in public good capacities and so they should—so good advocates should. That rank was conferred on those senior practitioners who had displayed an ability to argue both sides of difficult arguments who had shown a willingness and an ability to take on what were often unpopular cases and put up with the public opprobrium that went with them and because they could demonstrate how well they could perform in the profession—then they were conferred that title. Well the only thing that the title gives now really is a marketing advantage and of course the privilege that goes with being able to invoice at a much greater rate. I know a QC who today invoices at the rate of $14000 a day. That is what QC-ship confers on someone and it simply should not be that. 
Let us recognise the top performers in our profession recognising how important that is but we do not need to do what this bill provides for. It is a backward step. Let us embrace modernity let us move forward and for the profession that has modernised itself so much let us continue with what we have and recognise all top performers not with an anachronistic title but with a title that represents modern New Zealand.