Lawyer-client costs fiasco

A LAUNCESTON lawyer’s breach of a court costs order for more than three years should be viewed as professional misconduct, the Tasmanian Legal Profession Board has told the Supreme Court in Hobart.

The court heard the lawyer was given 60 days to pay $1250 after he wasted Federal Circuit Court time by mistakenly telling his client to go to Burnie instead of Launceston for a family law hearing, and for failing to inform the court that his client would be appearing without him.

The payment was to be made to the other party in the matter, his client’s ex-partner.

The Supreme Court yesterday heard the lawyer accepted an offer from his client to pay the costs.

“In or about October 2017 when [his client] indicated that he would not be able to pay the order … that’s when he [the lawyer] paid the order in full together with interest,” The Legal Profession Board barrister Kate Cuthbertson said.

“The reliance on [his client’s] offer to pay flies in the face of the order itself.”

Ms Cuthbertson said the board was not seeking an order for the lawyer to be struck off or suspended from practising law, but was seeking an order for him to complete an ethics course and pay a fine.

“The conduct clearly amounts to professional misconduct. It constitutes a flagrant breach of an order made by a court,” she said.

Ms Cuthbertson said it was only the lawyer’s failure to pay the costs for more than three years that was the subject of the complaint against him.

The lawyer’s barrister William Ayliffe, SC, said the lawyer had “albeit late” apologised to his client’s ex-partner and to the Federal Circuit Court.

Mr Ayliffe said the lawyer was also willing to pay additional costs the woman had incurred as a result of bringing the complaint.

“[His] conduct is not so serious or so substantial as to be regarded as disgraceful to the extent that it is deserving to be categorised as professional misconduct,” Mr Ayliffe said.

He said that at the time the lawyer accepted his client’s offer to pay the costs, the lawyer was experiencing upheaval in his personal life and mental anguish.

Chief Justice Alan Blow has reserved his decision about whether the lawyer’s behaviour constituted professional misconduct or something less serious.