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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

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C.O.885

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should apply for admission of English barristers and solicitors to the "Colonial Bar." My desire is to make it fair to both sides and equally applicable.

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: Sir Wilfrid Laurier thinks Canada may not be willing to agree.

Sir WILFRID LAURIER: I say Canada ought to have no jurisdiction in the matter.

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: That is a very important block, and so again with Australia there is an important block.

Mr. DEAKIN: You could not make it conditional, of course?

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: You may depend upon it that although the English Parliament has, perhaps, a higher and more absolute power over Englishmen than any governing body has over any State, still there are unseen but unmistakable limitations to which Parliament is subject and when it comes up against a profession like the English Bar, it is very apt to discover that its limitations are somewhat substantial.

Dr. SMARTT: Especially as the profession has a considerable number

of votes.

Mr. LLOYD GEORGE: Their influence is far-reaching.

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: The English Bar is extraordinarily well- represented.

Sir JOSEPH WARD: I can only say that in our country there is no profession that stands higher in our estimation than the English Bar; we look upon them as the great representatives of a noble profession in every way, and I do not want to do anything that would in any way either weaken or interfere with any of the rights of the profession in England, very far from it. I would not be presumptuous enough to do anything of the kind, and we are anxious to bring about reciprocity between them upon fair terms only. What I would suggest is, that with the addition of the words I have proposed here, perhaps the resolution might be printed. I do not know whether I have amplified it sufficiently to meet what I have tried to convey, and in the mean- time, after it is printed, we might defer it until there is an opportunity of considering it. In any case, I have sufficient common-sense to know that if we proposed anything which was regarded by the English profession as adverse to their interests, we could not expect them to conform to it; we certainly do not want to make any change unless it is an act of goodwill on both sides. The matter has been brought forward in New Zealand by some of the very best men in our country, and I am anxious before we go away from this Conference that we should have an opportunity of considering whether we cannot show a little genuine and practical feeling of reciprocity between our countries on both sides of the water.

CHAIRMAN: Can you not put it in such a form as we have had a good many resolutions as would invite that consideration? You speak of getting at the feeling of the Bar, but we certainly cannot get the feeling of the Bar I do not see before we separate, as we should probably separate, to-morrow. how it is possible to get very much of an outside opinion, and if you could

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have worded your resolution so as to meet Sir William Robson's view it Thirteenth Day. would have been convenient.

Sir JOSEPH WARD: I would be very happy to do so and to put it in such a way as to invite a suggestion from them. I do not desire to hurry it. Perhaps it may stand until to-morrow and then in a few minutes we might be able to deal with it.

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: Yes, I am quite sure that the English Bar would be desirous of doing what they can. I think I may say for the Bar that we have not behaved ungenerously to those who have sought admission to our ranks. Of course the privilege is a very valuable one and we have accorded it very freely to Scotch and Irish barristers. The limitations stand against them as much as against our brethren across the seas. There is no differentiation between one who lives in these Islands and one who lives beyond them under the same flag as far as we are concerned, but we have been obliged in order to maintain the peculiar status of the English Bar to be very strict indeed about our regulations as to admission, because it is a very singular status. It means that we have to give up many classes of work that solicitors enjoy; we are restricted in many somewhat singular and peculiar ways and in return we have very exceptional privileges.. The Bar is very jealous both of its privileges and of its limitations. It is as keen about its limitations as about its privileges and it would not be in any sectional or purely national spirit that the thing would be considered; it would be considered on very broad grounds. That is why, as far as I am concerned, I would like to see precisely what it is we were invited to do before we took definite

any step. I would certainly ask the Conference not to pass a resolution which might bring the government into conflict with the Bar upon a matter of this kind.

Mr. DEAKIN : I suppose you speak now as a member of the government.

Sir WILLIAM ROBSON: As a Member of the Government and as a barrister. I desire to see the Bar and the Government in continual accord.

Mr. DEAKIN: May I suggest as pertinent to this subject a matter which on one of its sides at all events may appeal even to the English Bar. It is rather anomalous that English barristers who have gone to the Outer Dominions, and while there have reached a position which has qualified them to receive silk, some of them receiving it in consequence of having held for some years the highest position obtainable in their States, that of Attorney-General, and adviser to the Governor. They advise him not only as Attorney-General but in an independent capacity in times when he does not desire ministerial but professional advice on matters of serious import to himself. It seems anomalous that those who have been honoured by being made King's Counsel, who are English barristers on their return to this country should find that there is one King in Great Britain and another King in the Commonwealth, and that they have ceased to be IIis Majesty's Counsel or entitled to that recognition here.

Of course the circumstances are so various that I must not be understood as endeavouring to lay down the doctrine that everyone who is made a K.C. in any part of the Dominions should be qualified here, but would venture to put it as far as this, that unless some disability could be shown, some want of qualification or standing or some particular cause which should deprive a professional man of standing of the honour he has enjoyed in one of the great communities beyond the seas, he should retain his professional rank. I take

I 19146.

S

8 May 1907.

RECIPROCITY AS

TO BARRISTERS.

(Chairman.)