Our thoughts on doubling the practice training period for new lawyers

The Ministry of Law (“MinLaw”) introduced the Legal Profession (Amendment) Bill (the “Bill”) for First Reading in Parliament on 3 October 2023.

The Bill, when passed, is slated to strengthen the professional training regime for lawyers in Singapore and better equip law graduates with the necessary skills and competencies to meet the demands of the future economy and society.

The Bill introduces key amendments to implement the recommendations of the Committee for the Professional Training of Lawyers (“CPTL”), and makes other miscellaneous and technical amendments to the Legal Profession Act (“LPA”).

The Bill makes the following legislative amendments to give effect to the CPTL’s recommendations:

  1. Decouple admission to the Singapore Bar from the completion of a practice training contract;

  2. Lengthen the practice training period from six months to one year;

  3. Confer on practice trainees limited rights to practise after six months of training;

  4. Permit up to three months of the practice training contract to be completed at approved in-house legal departments of approved corporations; and

  5. Introduce a moratorium for practice training contract applications.

Of the amendments, the change that has made the most waves in the legal industry is the lengthening of the training period from 6 to 12 months. Here are our thoughts on the matter.

Our Thoughts

The truth is that it is hard to trust newly qualified lawyers after just 6 months of training.

We welcome this change because the current system does not afford firms and trainees sufficient time for the trainees to get up to speed with legal work before being assessed for the purposes of retention.

From our firm’s perspective, it takes a trainee about 4 months to learn the basic ropes, and it is arguably unfair to subject the trainees to retention assessment until after the 4-month mark. Yet, under the previous system, and understandably so, trainees expect to be informed about retention after 4 months. The old system’s expectations on both firms and trainees are arguably unrealistic and therefore yield unpredictable or arbitrary retention results, driven more by economic factors rather than the more ideal interest of grooming the next generation.

Benefits

Lawyering entails a steep learning curve. A longer period:

  1. allows firms to more meaningfully rotate trainees into different practice areas, which is a requirement of practice training;

  2. affords more opportunities for contact time with the supervising solicitor, which is a common complaint amongst practice trainees;

  3. gives firms a more realistic period (perhaps from the 4th to 10th month) to make a more holistic and fair assessment of the trainees’ performance before deciding on retention. This could also give trainees more lead time to seek alternate employment if they are not retained;

  4. helps practice trainees discover themselves, and for themselves, whether they indeed have a sustainable interest in pursuing a career in practising law; and

  5. is in line with many other jurisdictions, for example, Australia (12 months) and United Kingdom (24 months for solicitors).

Downsides?

Well, it depends whose perspective you’re looking at this from.

For firms, a longer gestation period may result in a longer duration of being unable to charge clients for work done by a trainee, when taking into consideration the reality of today's cost-conscious client. That being said, this is a matter of client management as there is no legal prohibition against charging clients for work done by a trainee.

For trainees, a longer training period may reduce the short-term (the next 6 months) remuneration of the practice trainee because the training contract honorarium is only meant to cover the trainee’s basic expenses during the practice training period. However, a short-term financial sacrifice may result in longer-term intangible but valuable gains.

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References:

  • The Ministry of Law, Singapore’s Press Release 3 October 2023 “Strengthening the Professional Training Regime for Lawyers in Singapore“

  • Report of the Committee for the Professional Training of Lawyers (CPTL Recommendations)

Mark TENG