Professor Jeffrey Pinsler, S.C., is one of six new Senior Counsels to be appointed in Legal Year 2008. A leading expert in the field of civil and criminal evidence, procedure and dispute resolution, he most recently published Ethics and Professional Responsibility: A Code for the Advocate and Solicitor (”Ethics: A Code“), widely viewed as a groundbreaking work. Prof Pinsler is a member of the regional panel of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre, a principal mediator of the Singapore Mediation Centre, and sits on various professional committees. He is also an ad hoc District Judge of the Subordinate Courts.

You recently published Ethics: A Code. In writing this acclaimed book, what did you hope to achieve?

The Chief Justice asked me to write this book for younger lawyers who need to get to grips with the whole infrastructure of legal ethics. Presently, the regulatory regime in Singapore is interspersed among a variety of sources, including statutes, case law, and practice directions. What I tried to do was to show how these ethical rules relate to more fundamental principles, by presenting these rules in a systematic and cohesive framework.

I developed an overarching principle, from which one can extract six core principles, including the lawyer’s duty to the Court, the lawyer’s duty to the client, lawyers’ duties to each other and the lawyer’s duty to the public. These core principles each occupy one Part in the book, and can themselves be subdivided into more specific principles - the chapter principles. At the lowest level, I organized under each chapter principle the most specific rules (the ‘sub-principles’).

Hence, the Code has four levels of inter-linking principles. My purpose was to demonstrate how even the most specific rule can be linked to more fundamental principles. To my knowledge the approach is novel. The idea is to make legal ethics more understandable, so that the lawyer in practice is not just saying: “This is what I must do here”, but rather, understands the rationale of the rule. Every sub-principle has its root in the overarching principle.

Unscrupulous lawyers have hogged news headlines of late. Are the professional ethics of Singapore lawyers in a state of decline?

No, I don’t believe that lawyers are generally less moral than they used to be. Certainly, in the last year or so, there have been more disciplinary cases. I’ve looked at the history of such cases since 2001, which I referred to in my book.1

But I think this trend is not because more lawyers are behaving badly, but because we’re taking ethics more seriously now than ever before. There have been some glaring, terrible cases, especially the David Rasif case, which have helped raise public consciousness. We also have a new Chief Justice, one of whose major concerns is to implement a more effective ethical system and to enhance the profession’s consciousness of ethics.

So it is a positive sign, to the extent that there is now greater awareness about legal ethics, and tighter enforcement. Of course, this means that there may be more disciplinary cases than in the past.

Are there any reforms you especially hope to see in the rules governing the legal profession?

It is particularly important that the statutory rules governing clients’ accounts are effective enough to prevent breaches of trust. This is a current priority of the authorities.

I also think that the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct) Rules can be improved. Some rules are quite vague. The whole approach in Singapore can be more systematic and detailed, if you compare it with codes in countries like Australia, England and New Zealand. That is one reason why I formulated the Code. Of course, the Code is not perfect, but perhaps the authorities could look at it and extrapolate, if they do amend the existing legislation.

Can, and should, legal ethics be taught - say, as a compulsory module in the law school curriculum?

I think whether legal ethics can be taught depends very much on the person’s moral perspective. If a person doesn’t care about integrity and lacks a social consciousness - there’s not much you can do. But I think that such people form a very small category. The vast majority of people have a moral sense, which can be developed, and for that, ethics education certainly has a role.

You can’t just teach rules dogmatically, however - which might pose problems for having a compulsory module in NUS. The obvious advantage of a compulsory course is that all students would be exposed to ethics.

However, student participation (through presentations and projects) is an important feature in ethics education. We have about 250 students each year, so we would need to have a lot of staff teaching to give personal attention to the students. You could do it with lectures and tutorials, of course, but that will not be as effective.

Tell us a little about your diverse professional experiences, and which ones you enjoyed most. Why not litigation?

I teach and/or carry out research every day in NUS law school. I also enjoy my role as a District Judge as my subjects are essentially practice-related. Judicial work is also appealing because you don’t take sides - you just apply the law objectively.

I have also been involved in arbitration, and appeared in court as amicus curiae (”friend of the court”). An amicus curiae has the freedom of expressing his views on the law unaffected by parties’ interests. It is a weighty responsibility, though, because the court expects a lot from you.

Ultimately, I think, “to each his own”. Some lawyers love conveyancing. Others thrive on corporate work or as legal counsel. Excitement to some is aggravation to others. As far as litigation is concerned, many lawyers don’t like it - too much pressure.

Obviously, some lawyers thrive on the pressure, and have established a reputation for themselves in court. Anything else would bore them. But I would say the majority don’t enjoy that aspect of litigation.

Recently, controversy arose over how Senior Counsels (”SC”) are selected. Should SCs be required to put in a minimum amount of court work?

My concern is an ethical one, from the public perspective. The assumption is that once you’re an SC, you’ll be getting work from a lot of people since you’re considered a top litigator. When a member of the public approaches an SC to handle a case, he or she must have the confidence that the SC has the experience to perform the work to the standard required of an SC. SCs generally command higher fees for which they must give due consideration.

If an SC is out of court for a long time and decides he wants to go back to litigation, he should inform the client that he has not been in court for some time, and perhaps charge less than other SCs might charge. It would not be fair to the client if the SC still holds himself out as a “litigation SC”, because the SC may have lost some of his quality in the meantime.

As for myself, I was not appointed on the basis of court work but on my publications (which are primarily concerned with court work) and other contributions to the Legal Profession.

In general, SCs, if appointed on the basis of their court work, must perpetuate that standing by continuing to put in court work. It may not be possible to compel SCs to meet a specific minimum requirement, because cases may not always come along. But there should perhaps be an understanding that, for a period of time after an SC is appointed, he or she should do his or her utmost to conduct court work on a regular basis.

Any gems of advice for aspiring SCs?

Integrity, hard work and a passion to contribute to the process of law in Singapore.
Justin and Zewei are associate editors of the SLR