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Committees Trade In Legal Services (formerly known as GATS) General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) Committee 2009/2010 Interim Report
Committees Trade In Legal Services (formerly known as GATS) General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) Committee 2009/2010 Interim Report 
| General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) Committee 2009/2010 Interim Report |
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| Thursday, 17 December 2009 01:29pm | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 For the 2009/2010 term, the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) Committee is chaired by Christopher Leong, assisted by the Deputy Chairperson, Andrew Khoo. The GATS Committee has 15 members, all from Kuala Lumpur and Selangor except for one from Kedah. The GATS Committee’s objectives are to:
The GATS Committee actively engages in discussions and seminars
organised by government authorities and bodies, in particular the
Attorney General’s Chambers (AGC), the Ministry of International Trade
and Industry (MITI), the Professional Services Development Corporation
(PSDC), Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM), and foreign law societies and
associations.
On 22 May 2008, a dialogue on the Malaysia International Islamic Financial Centre (MIFC) initiatives was held at BNM between BNM, the AGC, the Bar Council (BC) and Members of the Malaysian Bar. BNM proposed to allow the entry of five foreign legal firms into Malaysia under a stand-alone model to practise in the Islamic Finance sector. BC, on the other hand, believes that Malaysia has sufficient local expertise in the area of Islamic Finance, thus the need to allow foreign firms to come in under a stand-alone set up is unnecessary. A better option would be to have a graduated liberalisation of the legal services sector. The initial phase would consist of the setting up of joint law ventures (JLV) between local legal firms and foreign legal firms. On 24 Feb 2009, the Committee organised a Roundtable Discussion on Malaysia-Australia Legal Services, attended by members of the Malaysian Bar and the Law Council of Australia, and representatives from MITI, AGC and BNM. The Discussion centred around BC’s proposed roadmap for the liberalisation of legal services in Malaysia with the Australians sharing their experiences in exporting legal services. The BC proposed that the entry of foreign firms be done via a JLV model. The Law Council of Australia was in agreement with BC’s proposal. Through this method, Australian law firms could improve their understanding of local laws and the local legal business environment from the Malaysian legal firms. In June 2009, Committee representatives attended the brainstorming sessions on the matter with experts from the United Nation Development Program (UNDP), which were jointly organised by Economic Planning Unit, MITI and the Malaysian External Trade Development Corporation. At the second session on 17 June 2009, Christopher Leong presented the proposed roadmap for liberalisation before the experts and representatives from other professional organisations. The experts commended BC for coming up with such a roadmap and their feedback was helpful in assisting BC to further revise the same. On 8 July 2009, a number of Committee members joined the Office Bearers in welcoming the Lord Mayor of London, Alderman Ian Luder, and members of the Law Society of England and Wales to BC. On the agenda was the progress of the liberalisation of the legal services sector in Malaysia, and the Law Society of England and Wales stated that BC must play a central role in the process. Despite having a different view from BC’s proposal of entry via JLV, the foreign representatives were also unhappy with the restrictive proposal by BNM to allow stand-alone foreign firms to only practise in Islamic banking and finance transactions. On 20 July 2009, Andrew Khoo presented BC’s views on liberalisation and the roadmap before PSDC. Four days later, Heng Hiang Swee, another GATS Committee member, delivered a similar presentation at a meeting with the National Professional Services Export Council. In Sept 2009, the Committee prepared its “Memorandum on the Liberalisation of the Legal Services Sector in Malaysia: Proposed Roadmap for Liberalisation of the Legal Services Sector in West Malaysia”, which was submitted to the Prime Minister, MITI, AGC, BNM and also to the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Dato’ Seri Nazri Abdul Aziz. In response to the Memorandum, AGC invited BC for a meeting and expressed its agreement with BC’s proposed roadmap. AGC also requested for BC’s input in drafting amendments to the Legal Profession Act (LPA) 1976 to include the provision for the entry of foreign law firms and lawyers into the country. The draft amendments are expected to be tabled in the Parliament in the first quarter of 2010. The Committee also submitted a Memorandum on the Proposal to Repeal Part IIA of the LPA 1976 to AGC in Oct 2009, which must be considered concurrently with the Memorandum submitted in Sept 2009. Part IIA (sections 28A, 28B, 28C, 28D and 28E) of the LPA was first enacted in Jan 1978, and was brought into force on 1 Feb 1999. It was introduced in the wake of the Essential Security Cases Regulations (ESCAR) trials controversy of 1977 when the Malaysian Bar adopted a resolution to boycott the ESCAR trials because of the removal of the traditional safeguards enjoyed by accused persons. It should be noted that the introduction of Part IIA was designed to overcome the perceived boycott by providing for Special Admission Certificates to be issued by the AGC to enable a foreign legal practitioner or a current non-practising Malaysian lawyer to be specially admitted to defend an accused person facing an ESCAR trial in court. BC believes the original reasons that may have existed 31 years ago to enable foreign legal practitioners to undertake a case in Court on a special certificate no longer exist, and there are no new reasons. BC is of the opinion that the admission of foreign lawyers should be considered as part of the overall GATS questions and not independently under the 1978 amendments. An outright liberalisation utilising Part IIA would be injurious both to the local Bar and the public. The Executive Officer for the GATS Committee is Adilah Ariffin who can be contacted at 03-2034 2071 or 03-2031 3003 ext 160, or by email at adilah@malaysianbar.org.my. Christopher Leong Chairperson GATS Committee
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