Derek Achong

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

A group of new at­tor­neys have been warned against com­pro­mis­ing their in­tegri­ty as they em­bark on their ca­reers in the le­gal pro­fes­sion. 

High Court Judge Frank Seep­er­sad gave the ad­vice as he de­liv­ered the fea­ture ad­dress when 60 at­tor­neys were called to the bar dur­ing a cer­e­mo­ny at the Hall of Jus­tice in Port-of-Spain.

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad stat­ed that be­ing ad­mit­ted to prac­tice law is not on­ly the cul­mi­na­tion of aca­d­e­m­ic achieve­ment but the ac­cep­tance of an en­dur­ing pub­lic re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to up­hold the prin­ci­ples that form the ba­sis of the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice. 

Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said: “The work that you will un­der­take as at­tor­neys-at-law will shape out­comes, re­solve dis­putes, vin­di­cate rights, pro­tect lib­er­ties and in­vari­ably af­fect the tra­jec­to­ry of lives, fam­i­lies, busi­ness­es and com­mu­ni­ties.

“It is, there­fore, crit­i­cal for you to un­der­stand that in­tegri­ty is not in­ci­den­tal to this pro­fes­sion. It is its foun­da­tion,” he added. 

He sug­gest­ed that they must have the dis­ci­pline and pro­fes­sion­al courage to pro­vide ad­vice ground­ed in law and prin­ci­ple rather than be­ing guid­ed by con­ve­nience, pop­u­lar­i­ty or fi­nan­cial in­cen­tive.

“Your in­tegri­ty will ul­ti­mate­ly be mea­sured not by pub­lic de­c­la­ra­tions, but by every­day de­ci­sions: the ser­vice you pro­vide, the rep­re­sen­ta­tions you make to the Court, the fees you charge and the man­ner in which you treat those who de­pend up­on your guid­ance,” Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said. 

“The ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice de­pends up­on prac­ti­tion­ers ca­pa­ble of ex­er­cis­ing re­straint, fair­ness, in­de­pen­dence and dis­ci­plined judg­ment even when prin­ci­ple de­mands per­son­al sac­ri­fice,” he added. 

Stat­ing that pub­lic trust and con­fi­dence in the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice would be shaped by the ser­vice they pro­vide to fu­ture clients, Jus­tice Seep­er­sad warned the at­tor­neys to not dis­crim­i­nate based on clients’ per­son­al cir­cum­stances. 

“You must there­fore en­sure that every client, re­gard­less of sta­tus or cir­cum­stance, is af­ford­ed due process and fair rep­re­sen­ta­tion with­in the bound­aries of the law,” Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said. 

“Jus­tice is sus­tained not by leg­is­la­tion alone, but by the col­lec­tive will­ing­ness of in­sti­tu­tions and pro­fes­sion­als alike to up­hold fair­ness, ac­count­abil­i­ty, re­straint and re­spect for hu­man dig­ni­ty,” he added. 

He ex­pressed hope that at­tor­neys, judges and stake­hold­ers in the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice would con­tin­ue to work to­geth­er to build a coun­try “ground­ed in in­tegri­ty, guid­ed by jus­tice and sus­tained by eq­ui­ty and em­pa­thy”.

“If these prin­ci­ples are up­held con­sis­tent­ly and coura­geous­ly, the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice will con­tin­ue to stand as an en­dur­ing safe­guard of con­sti­tu­tion­al democ­ra­cy and a source of re­as­sur­ance to the cit­i­zens whom it ex­ists to serve,” Jus­tice Seep­er­sad said.