Current leadership
The current President is Philip Wallis, a company solicitor at the Sydney-based construction company, the Vinta Group. Mr Wallis is supported in his role by a National Vice President and the Immediate Past National President. These positions are voluntary for a term of two years. ACLA also employs a small, full-time staff, headed by the CEO/General Counsel. The CEO/general counsel is assisted by the Company Secretary/National Treasurer and a Member Services Manager.
Membership
3,000 individual members nationwide, of which 75 per cent are practicing in-house lawyers – both public and private sector.
The remaining 25 per cent of members largely comprise private practice lawyers interested in the in-house market, specialist recruitment consultants and other interested parties. It is not necessary to be a lawyer to belong to ACLA.
Status
ACLA is a voluntary, private members’ educational organisation, with no formal links to any bar association or law society. Because Australian corporate lawyers are largely regulated by independent bodies, in-house corporate counsel’s right to legal privilege depends on their registration rather than membership of either ACLA or their local law society. Government lawyers are generally exempt from the requirement to hold a practicing certificate but otherwise have similar rights and obligations to in-house corporate lawyers. ACLA does not issue practicing certificates or require its members to submit to its own independent disciplinary regime.
Benefits of membership
The organisation offers a mixture of educational and social events for its members. Each year, ACLA organises a two-day national conference, where various regulatory and managerial issues are discussed. In addition, the organisation produces a quarterly journal, a member directory, an in-house lawyers’ practice manual and an ethics handbook.
Nationally, the organisation offers a mentoring programme for in-house counsel; in-house lawyer awards, and also prepares submissions on law reform proposals on issues that affect in-house lawyers. Each sub-national division offers its own series of seminars and events, where topical legal issues are discussed.
Commercially, ACLA has partnered with a range of external service providers. It offers a range of services, including legal updates, document assembly systems, professional indemnity insurance and the mentoring scheme for junior-in-house lawyers. A fully accredited graduate diploma of in-house legal practice is also offered, provided in association with the College of Law in Sydney.
International links
ACLA has a long-standing association with the Association of Corporate Counsel in the US, and also with in-house groups in various present and former Commonwealth countries. These include associations in New Zealand, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Canada. Long-term, ACLA intends to enter into benefits sharing agreement with its partner associations.
Current projects
“Our newly-established mentoring programme for junior in-house counsel has proved very successful. Following a pilot project in the state of Victoria, the programme has now been rolled out nationwide.
“Lawyers who are entering the in-house market for the first time are matched up with senior in-house practitioners for up to six months. The feedback we’ve received suggests that both parties have benefitted from the programme. The junior lawyers can ask for advice on ethical or managerial matters in a safe environment, while the mentors benefit from being exposed new ideas and ways of working.
“Our ethics handbook for in-house counsel is produced in association with the St James Ethics Centre Sydney, Australia. The handbook suggests a number of hypothetical scenarios that in-house lawyers may face, and discusses what they must and should do in those circumstances. The handbook concept has now been picked up by the International Bar Association, and could potentially form the basis of a worldwide ethics code for in-house lawyers.
“In terms of issues affecting in-house lawyers in Australia, legal privilege and the national harmonisation of the legal profession are currently at the foreground of our efforts. The Australian Law Reform Commission was asked by the former government to recommend whether there should be any changes to the privilege regime. In this country in-house lawyers have the same right to claim privilege as the rest of the profession and ACLA is keen to defend that position. In addition, corporations are entitled to claim legal privilege on the same basis as individuals. While there has been some discussion about how these rights should apply and/or be claimed in the in-house context, there is no movement to abrogate or seriously restrict them at this time.
“In relation to the creation of a national regulatory regime for the legal profession, it’s been a rocky ride for in-house lawyers. In order to work effectively, each state and territory must adopt a set of common rules to regulate its legal profession. In practice, the common rules have all been agreed to, but each state is adopting them in different ways. In the state of Victoria, the state completely forgot about the in-house legal profession when drafting its new rules. As a result, for some time, none of our members were able to obtain their practicing certificates.
“The issue of personal liability is also becoming a major issue for in-house counsel in Australia. It’s becoming a real risk that litigators and regulators may sue both the company and its management team in a personal capacity – and that could often include the company’s general counsel. For that reason, we’ve recently launched an enhanced personal indemnity insurance scheme for our members.” Peter Turner
Recent sponsors of our C2C programme
