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Code of Professional Conduct
PREFACE1
The legal profession has developed over the centuries to meet a public need for legal services on a professional
basis. Traditionally, this has involved the provision of advice and representation to protect or advance the rights,
liberties and property of a client by a trusted adviser with whom the client has a personal relationship and whose
integrity, competence and loyalty are assured.2
In order to satisfy this need for legal services adequately, lawyers and the quality of service they provide
must command the confidence and respect of the public. This can only be achieved if lawyers establish and maintain
a reputation for both integrity and high standards of legal skill and care. The lawyers of many countries in the
world, despite differences in their legal systems, practices, procedures and customs, have all imposed upon themselves
substantially the same basic standards. Those standards invariably place their main emphasis on integrity and competence.
In Canada, the provincial legislatures have entrusted to the legal profession through its governing bodies
responsibility for maintaining standards of professional conduct and for disciplining lawyers who fail to meet
them. Generally, the preparation and publication of codes of ethics and professional conduct have been left to
the profession. It is a responsibility that must be accepted and carried out by the profession as a whole.
The pertinent laws in Canada use various terms to describe conduct that subjects the lawyer to discipline,
for example, "professional misconduct", "conduct unbecoming" and "acts derogatory to the
honour or dignity of the Bar". Some statutes also provide that disciplinary action may be taken if a lawyer
is convicted of an indictable offence, or for "misappropriation or wrongful conversion", or "gross
negligence" or for conduct "incompatible with the best interests of the public or the members of the
[Law] Society", or for breach of the applicable statute itself or the rules made under it.3
With few exceptions the statutes do not specify the kinds of conduct that will subject a lawyer to discipline.
For its part, the Code does not attempt to define professional misconduct or conduct unbecoming, nor does it try
to evaluate the relative importance of the various rules or the gravity of a breach of any of them. Those functions
are the responsibility of the various governing bodies. The rules that follow are therefore intended to serve as
a guide, and the commentaries and notes appended to them are illustrative only. By enunciating principles of what
is and is not acceptable professional conduct, the Code is designed to assist governing bodies and practitioners
alike in determining whether in a given case the conduct is acceptable, thus furthering the process of self-government.
The essence of professional responsibility is that the lawyer must act at all times uberrimae fidei,
with utmost good faith to the court, to the client, to other lawyers, and to members of the public. Given the many
and varied demands to which the lawyer is subject, it is inevitable that problems will arise. No set of rules can
foresee every possible situation, but the ethical principles set out in the Code are intended to provide a framework
within which the lawyer may, with courage and dignity, provide the high quality of legal services that a complex
and ever-changing society demands.4
The extent to which each lawyer's conduct should rise above the minimum standards set out by the Code is
a matter of personal decision. The lawyer who would enjoy the respect and confidence of the community as well as
of other members of the legal profession must strive to maintain the highest possible degree of ethical conduct.
The greatness and strength of the legal profession depend on high standards of professional conduct that permit
no compromise.
The Code of Professional Conduct that follows is to be understood and applied in the light of its primary
concern for the protection of the public interest. This principle is implicit in the legislative grants of self-government
referred to above. Inevitably, the practical application of the Code to the diverse situations that confront an
active profession in a changing society will reveal gaps, ambiguities and apparent inconsistencies.5 In such cases, the principle of protection of the public interest will
serve to guide the practitioner to the applicable principles of ethical conduct and the true intent of the Code.
NOTES
1. The footnotes relate the provisions of the Code to pertinent earlier Codes, rulings, by-laws,
statutes, judicial dicta, text books and articles, as well as to certain other materials. They are selective, not
exhaustive, and merely supplement the text. For abbreviations and bibliography, see pages 85 and 87.
2. "The core of the proposition is that problems of ... rights or property call for a personal relationship
with a trusted adviser, whose discretion is absolute, who serves no master but his client, and whose competence
is assured. The codes and traditions of the professions who supply these services support the basic proposition.
They also display the uniformity that its truth would lead one to expect." Bennion, p. 16.
3. Abstract of disciplinary provisions:
Alberta: Legal Profession Act, R.S.A. 1980, c. L-9
s. 47 "conduct incompatible with the best interests of the public or the members of the Society"
"tends to harm the standing of the legal profession generally"
British Columbia: Barristers and Solicitors Act, R.S.B.C. 1979, c. 26
s. 50 "misappropriation or wrongful conversion"
"professional misconduct"
"conduct unbecoming a member"
"breach of this Act or the Rules made under it"
s. 55 "convicted of an indictable offence"
Manitoba: Law Society Act, R.S.M. 1970, c. L-100
s. 45 "professional misconduct"
"conduct unbecoming a barrister, solicitor, or student"
New Brunswick: Barristers Society Act, 1931, S.N.B., c. 50 as am. by S.N.B. 1954, c. 99
s. 19 "professional misconduct"
default re clients' moneys
breach of Act or regulation
Newfoundland: Law Society Act, R.S.N. 1970, c. 201
s. 37 "conduct unbecoming a barrister, solicitor, student-at-law or articled clerk"
Nova Scotia: Barristers and Solicitors Act, R.S.N.S. c. B-2
s. 29 "professional misconduct"
"conduct unbecoming a barrister or articled clerk"
s. 31 "absconding, insane or insolvent"
Ontario: Law Society Act, R.S.O. 1980, c. 233
s. 34 "professional misconduct"
"conduct unbecoming a barrister and solicitor"
s. 38 "conduct unbecoming a student member"
Prince Edward Island: Law Society and Legal Profession Act, R.S.P.E.I. 1974, c. L-9
s. 27 "professional misconduct"
"conduct unbecoming a member"
Quebec: Bar Act, R.S.Q. 1977, c. B-1
s. 107 "derogatory to the honour or dignity of the Bar or prejudicial to the discipline of its members"
"position or office ... incompatible with the practice of the profession of advocate"
"occupation, industry or trade carried on or the position held is incompatible with the honour or dignity
of the Bar"
s. 111 "conviction of an indictable offence"
Saskatchewan: Legal Profession Act, R.S.S. c. L-10
s. 59 "conduct unbecoming a barrister and solicitor"
s. 70 "convicted of an indictable offence"
England: Cordery on Solicitors (7th ed., 1981), p. 333
"... because he has been guilty of an act or omission for which the Act or some other statute prescribes that
penalty, or because he has committed an act of misconduct which renders him unfit to be permitted to continue in
practice."
(at p. 335): "Misconduct which makes a solicitor unfit to continue in practice may be divided into three kinds:
criminal conduct, professional misconduct and unprofessional conduct."
(at p. 336): "The jurisdiction is not limited to cases where the misconduct charged amounts to an indictable
offence, or is professional in character, but extends to all cases where the solicitor's conduct is 'unprofessional',
i.e., such as renders him unfit to be an officer of the court."
"Is it a personally disgraceful offence or is it not? Ought any respectable solicitor to be called upon to
enter into that intimate discourse with (the offender) which is necessary between two solicitors even though they
are acting for opposite parties?" per Lord Esher M.R., in Re Weare (1893), 2 Q.B. 439 at 446 (C.A.).
"Counsel ... takes the position that the expressions (unprofessional conduct and professional misconduct)
are synonymous ... I agree ... that the phrases are often used interchangeably but cannot agree that this is always
so ... Accepting as I do that the terms are not synonymous ...", per McKay J. in Re Novak and Law Society
(1973) 31 D.L.R. (3d) 89 at 102 (B.C.S.C.).
4. "The law and its institutions change as social conditions change. They must change if they are to preserve,
much less advance, the political and social values from which they derive their purposes and their life. This is
true of the most important of legal institutions, the profession of law. The profession, too, must change when
conditions change in order to preserve and advance the social values that are its reason for being." Cheatham,
Availability of Legal Services: The Responsibility of the Individual Lawyer and the Organized Bar
(1965) 12 U.C.L.A.L. Rev. 438, 440.
5. "It is not possible to frame a set of rules which will particularize all the duties of the lawyer in all
the varied relations of his professional life ...". Sask. Preamble.
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