Extract from a letter dated 11 March 1970 from
Sir Ivo Rigby, Chief Justice of Hong Kong, to
Sir James McPetrie
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I don't think we have any problems here at the moment but I will
certainly avail myself of your kind offer of assistance if we do. I shall in
fact be writing to you fairly soon on what seems to me the desirability of ́
District Court judges, prior to appointment, giving the same undertaking as
those at present given by Supreme Court judges, that they will not, on
retirement, practise in the country in which they have officiated as judges.
As you will have recently heard from Denys Roberts, the matter has been
recently raised here by J.T. Williams, a District Court judge about to retire,
who put in an application to be admitted to practice here at the Bar. The
local Bar indicated their intention to oppose the application and, I
understand, they would have been supported in their opposition by the A.G.
Fortunately, Williams withdrew his application and is now going to Gibraltar
as Asst. A.G. [I think he is very lucky in his new appointment!
However, I would suggest that District Court judges ought to give an under-
taking not to practise. The difficulty may be to extract such an undertaking
from those already appointed
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but I think it worth trying.
སམ་*****