Shaming Disgraced Barristers Online – Plans announced by the UK Bar Standards Board

In an article on the Online edition of The Times yesterday, the UK Bar Standards Board announced plans to have the names of barristers facing disciplinary action would be published on their website along with the charges, time and date.

A number of thoughts came to mind when I first read the article. Firstly, I thought it was interesting how the justifications provided for these proposals were to encourage more “transparency”. That sure sounds good to me, doesn’t it to you? Not that I disagree with the proposals (I reserve expressing any opinion on that bit), but I do think its very amazing how easy it is to “spin” things in one’s favour.

Second, and more importantly, is the fact that there does not seem to be any opposition expressed by members of the Bar in UK or the public at large. Perhaps it is still “early days” and that such criticisms will come in due course. After all, this is one of the issues that Singaporeans are all too familiar with, and which often results in criticisms from “the West” of the way we do things here – we shame people. Of course I do believe that there are always valid grounds to do so, but it surprises me that a society that is significantly more “Rights conscious” than ours (I think they go overboard actually) have not yet challenged these proposals, seemingly letting them slip under the metaphorical radar. Off the top of my head I can think of criticism that they would/should put forward – the right to privacy, the right to a fair trial, and the list goes on.

One can imagine how problematic such a practice, if published online can be. Even if it is the mere listing of information that a particular barrister is due to face a hearing, with no indication of guilt either way, is likely to cause people to become suspicious – thus he would be unfairly prejudiced. In addition, even with a system of updating such information either through the subsequent publishing of the results of such hearing – not guilty or insufficient evidence, etc – seven days after the conclusion of the hearing would be unsatisfactory a solution as it presupposes that people will continue to visit the website regularly (and not the one-off or “once in a blue moon” kind of visit). The only practice which I believe to be acceptable (under what I understand to be the UK public’s position on Human Rights) is the listing of barristers who have been disbarred. This would serve as a warning to the public and prevent rogue barristers from practising “without a licence”.

The fact that such details are removed after 2 years or in the event of a successful appeal, is also unsatisfactory not merely for the reasons highlighted above, but because, as most people are aware, information posted on the Internet is at times – permanent – especially when they have been either copied and uploaded on another person’s website or when they are taken up by web-crawlers and search engines. It is likely to keep appearing whenever that person’s name is entered to the subject box of a search engine – extending his punishment, shaming, or being falsely accused – indefinitely.

As mentioned above, I do not express an opinion here as to whether practices of shaming people for offences and/or successful prosecution is right or wrong – it is widely accepted practice in Singapore. We are also rather open about it purpose and don’t attempt to sugar-coat it. The purpose of my writing the above is to highlight the inconsistencies which I see coming from a society which purports to be more rights conscious than us, even presuming to possess the moral authority to criticise our practices at times. How audacious, arrogant and hypocritical!