The bar reform can completely linger behind the scene —Pavlo Hrechkivskyi

The Secretary of the Bar Council of Ukraine, Pavlo Hrechkivskyi, believes that the bar reform shall provide for the changes to the field-specific law that meet the real threats to the independent profession status.

It was mentioned in his interview for “Yuridicheskaya Praktika”.

“If the violation of the advocates’ rights and guarantees is a key problem, which is actually evidenced by many facts, why do the law draftsmen start with the rewriting of the terms of office for the self-government bodies? Why is the legislator “interested” in the distribution of the advocates’ fees and the bar exam procedure, instead of looking for the ways to protect advocates from illegal searches and interference with the advocates’ privilege? Quite a strange priorities in a situation where human rights, not only the advocates’ professional rights, in our country are out of order”, - says Pavlo Hrechkivskyi.

The BCU Secretary is convinced that the attempts to substitute the bar development priorities are unlikely to be successful.

“Whatever hard they try to replace our agenda and priorities, I don’t believe that the amount of advocates’ fees, for example, is more important than the immunity from illegal interference with their work. No matter how hard some mates tried to heighten the conflicts in the bar self-government or to discredit the legal profession as a whole, this will not change our understanding of who is a friend and who is the enemy. So I would not recommend to use the Congress as a platform for scandals, unhealthy ambitions or settling of personal accounts”, - says Pavlo Hrechkivskyi.

The BCU Secretary considers the ideas of “a tame bar”, the prototype of which is the free legal aid (FLA) under the control of the Ministry of Justice, to be absurd and contrary to international recommendations to ensure the independence of the bar self-government.

According to Pavlo Hrechkivskyi, the elimination of the professional community from the reform developments is compromising the quality of changes and reduces their credibility. He noted that the approval of the draft amendments to the Law “On the Bar and Practice of Law” was obtained in a working group in December 2016. “Interestingly enough, according to the latest information, its text is still under consideration. Which is quite surprising, since the final working group meeting took place long ago, and in winter some members announced that the draft law is about to appear in the Parliament. If someone finalizes the draft law, we can assume that the bar reform has completely lingered behind the scene”, - thinks Pavlo Hrechkivskyi.

In his view, the Reporting and Election Congress of the advocates will show how consolidated the professional community is.

“It is important that every and each advocate, especially future Congress delegates, responsibly approach their participation in this process and do not devalue their chance to demonstrate that the bar is able to independently take both management and personnel decisions. To that end we have the self-government system and balance of powers existing and working. We do not need the invited conductors or directors. I am confident that the Congress will elect a worthy leader on its own”, - says the BCU Secretary.