You can hear those jaws hit the floor

Of all the people who might have been chosen to lead a crusade against disgusting, entitled, sexist behaviour and attitudes in the legal profession, I would not have put the house – or even a dollar – on it being Kathryn Beck.

The sounds of a thousand jaws hitting the floor accompanied the arrival of the announcement that Beck will chair the Law Society’s culture change taskforce.

Beck’s term as president of the society has been punctuated by scandal – largely through the revelations of sexually predatory behaviour by senior lawyers at Russell McVeagh. Not Beck’s fault – not the behaviour, anyway.

But when the society’s survey earlier this year showed a staggering 33 per cent of female lawyers and 14 per cent of male lawyers have experienced sexual harassment, Beck claimed to be ‘‘surprised and caught out’’ by the results.

This is simply not credible. Lawyers are supposed to spend their days dealing with facts. Well, here are the facts:

In 2015 the Law Society received a report into sexual harassment in New Zealand and Australia. It showed half of all lawyers surveyed were or had been at risk of harassment, and talked of the organisational ‘‘cultures of silence’’ that

led to almost 90 per cent of those bullied or harassed not reporting it.

The report was given to all participating law societies. It would have passed over Beck’s desk. As would another, a year later, this time conducted by Kiwi Josh Pemberton. It detailed the explicit sexism, including open harassment, experienced by junior female lawyers. That one can be downloaded from the Law Society’s own website.

How are we to interpret the lack of action in the wake of that evidence, and the decades-long, repeated pleas from female lawyers for change in the industry? Lawyers who gifted the society a purpose-made sexual harassment policy, ready for industry take-up, and got a decidedly lukewarm response?

Who could be blamed for the assumption that the evidence was ignored, until the media blew the lid on an industry-wide problem?

This is the same Law Society that secured a super-injunction to try to cover up a new case of alleged sexual harassment or bullying by a senior lawyer. That was in March this year – after the Russell McVeagh revelations. That move does not, you could argue, show a spirit of transparency and eagerness for change.

There are also, I believe, legitimate

questions over the makeup of the 14-member taskforce. Only two are nonlawyers (one practice manager and one legal executive) – but in the real world, workers in legal practices who are not lawyers are as likely to be targets of sexual harassment.

But such is the desperation for change that you’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone still working in the industry who is willing to comment publicly on the appointment of Beck.

Zoe Lawton, one of those willing to stick her neck out, points out Dame Silvia Cartwright, a qualified expert, independent of the Law Society, was appointed to lead the regulatory working group reviewing the Law Society complaints process.

‘‘I am confused as to why a qualified expert, again independent from the Law Society, was not appointed to lead the culture change taskforce. This seemed like the logical thing to do,’’ Lawton said.

Barrister Maria Dew, who is heading an investigation into the team environment of our national women’s hockey team, told me she was ‘‘extremely optimistic’’ about the working group.

There is a sense that, whoever leads this taskforce, something that might lead to change is much better than nothing.