Legal Tales | How gold standards ensure Hong Kong’s barristers are on their best behaviour
Hong Kong Bar Association enforces Code of Conduct that covers ethics, etiquette and keeping up public confidence in the justice system
A young, handsome and up-and-coming barrister one night stumbled upon his girlfriend’s chat messages. The messages led him to pay a surprise visit to a hotel room, where he found her with another man.
Possessed by the green giant (I mean the Hulk), he landed a few punches on the man and landed himself a conviction for assault. Then, he was struck as well, this time by the Hong Kong Bar Association, off the roll of barristers.
Such was a recent scene in the TVB drama – The Fading Gold. I think it struck gold, a golden opportunity to explain to you the self-regulatory regime of the Bar. Spoiler alert – it is old but gold, and definitely not fading.
The Hong Kong Bar Association, acting through the Bar Council (think an elected board of directors), enforces a Code of Conduct on its members and pupils (those who are training to become barristers). The current version has 15 chapters with 13 annexes, spanning 179 pages and going into every facet of being a barrister.
I say “being” because it is not just a barrister’s professional behaviour that is under the Bar Council’s watch, it is how barristers conduct themselves both in and out of court that is being watched and judged.
One prime example, my personal favourite, is that a barrister is not allowed to use the status of a barrister in a personal matter in order to gain (or even try to gain) any advantage over, or put pressure on, the other side.