The legal rebel with a cause

A self-confessed reactionary, the new Law Society president promises to listen to the profession

STEPHEN WARD

and JOJO MOYES

Described in the New Law Journal as "part Ross Perot, part Forrest Gump", Martin Mears is a man who elicits strong emotions.

Vilified and admired in equal parts, the rebel candidate is best known for his views on race and sex and for his judgment of a fellow candidate, Eileen Pembridge, whom he described as a "viper of political correctness" and accused of "washing the society's dirty linen in public".

In his own words, he is a "deeply reactionary" right-winger, openly hostile to the anti-discrimination measures being devised for the profession.

He is, however, a more complex character than his press tends to suggest. He has written articles denouncing right-wing MPs for advocating capital punishment. He is also in favour of women being admitted to his club, the United Oxford and Cambridge University Club, on the grounds that the majority wants it, rather than a desire for equality.

And he has managed to tap discontent among a growing number of solicitors who feel they are getting a poor deal in return for the increasing amount of practising certificate, insurance and indemnity funds running into many thousands of pounds that they pay to the Law Society each year. A recent survey of sole practitioners found that 60 per cent were unhappy with the service they got.

They have a growing list of grievances: the four-year ceiling on legal aid rates; the loss of conveyancing fees leading to cut-throat price warfare; the increasing costs of compensating the victims of crooked colleagues and dealing with moreregulations and rules.

Unlike the medical profession which has the British Medical Association acting as its trade union and the General Medical Council acting as regulatory and disciplinary body, the Law Society performs both roles. Many solicitors question how the society can act as both policeman and trade union, or at least whether the balance between the two roles is correct.

Mr Mears' manifesto accused the society of "arrogance, extravagance, ineptitude and pessimism". He campaigned for a Law Society which would "listen to the profession", and cut its spending. He also promised to cut the number of solicitors entering the profession.

He is a founder of the Norfolk solicitors' firm of Mears, Hobbs and Durrant, a six-partner firm with four offices. While he is president the Law Society will pay pounds 45,000 a year to his firm, and he will be entitled to use its flat near the High Court.