The Messenger June 2016

President’s Column
5
5
From the President
At last (or at least at the
time of writing) some
good weather has arrived.
It feels like it has been a
long, drawn out winter
this year and April was, by
any measure, cold and
miserable. It will probably
be raining again by the
time you read this article.
A good old-fashioned
heat wave would not go
amiss; I think we are due
one.
I was lucky enough to pick a
sunny morning to go out
with Forever Manchester,
the Community Foundation
for Greater Manchester, and
see some of the work they
do out in local communities.
Forever Manchester is my
chosen charity for my presidential
year and I came to
them through being introduced
to Nick Massey, their
inspiring Chief Executive. It
fitted perfectly with me
wanting to focus on a Manchester-based
charity and
one that works with disadvantaged
children and people
with additional needs.
Their focus is on ABCD –
Asset Based Community
Development, which in
essence means giving motivated
people the opportunity
to make things happen
for themselves and reducing
the dependency culture.
I use the words “dependency
culture” advisedly, as
I appreciate that this is a
controversial topic. It links
to the debate about how
welfare should be provided
and who is most “deserving”
of help. Forever Manchester
are there meeting people
who just want to get on
with their lives, make a bit of
difference at the grass roots
and build communities and
are making incremental but
real differences to the quality
of people’s lives. Forever
Manchester’s role is more
often than not to provide
the seed money for local
community projects, but
also to train people to become
community builders
in their own right and then
let them get on with it
rather than making them do
things their way.
At the Legal Awards in
March we raised over
£5,000 for them at the charity
raffle and I am grateful to
you all who contributed; I
am competing in the Salford
Triathlon at the end of
July to raise some more
funds for them. The link to
my Just Giving page is
https://www.justgiving.com
/ f u n d r a i s i n g / M i c h a e l -
Hardacre and I would really
appreciate any contributions
you can give for this
very worthy cause.
So, back to my other project
for the year, my reach out
mission to all of parts of the
profession. I canvassed
opinion from members of
our Family Law Committee,
including the Chair, Kim Aucott,
from Slater Heelis. The
Family Law Committee is
one of our more recent developments.
They were set
up from scratch 18 months
ago but still managed to
put on a very successful
conference last year. Their
next conference is coming
up on 21 June and I urge
local practitioners to attend.
There will be views from the
local judiciary including a
keynote speech from HHJ
Tyler and a fantastic all
round programme, including
updates on pensions
and children law and a
panel discussion on experts
which promises to be very
lively.
Later in the year, the Annual
Debate will be in the calendar
around October time
and the proposed topic this
year will be “Is family justice
biased against men?”
One of the real issues, unsurprisingly,
and one that
affects many area of practice
is court closures in outlying
areas. Morale in the
courts that are slated for
closure, but which are still
open, is by all accounts very
low.
One very clear pressure is
on costs, with hourly rates
under pressure and clients
not being able to fund litigation
privately or easily
and wanting to do things
on a shoestring. Client costs
is a very sensitive issue and
with so much information
easily available on the internet,
it is becoming increasingly
common for clients to
limit their instructions to
Family lawyers to the finer
points of litigation. In fact
the traditional solicitor
client relationship is changing
fundamentally. This is a
worrying trend since without
the full picture at an initial
stage, Family solicitors
can easily be heading down
the route of a potential negligence
claim.
On a practical level, dealing
with litigants in person is
fraught with difficulties.
Michael Hardacre
There is pressure on the Judiciary
due to a lack of resources
so a practitioner up
against a litigant in person,
will often find their case
stood down with a direction
to attempt to sort things
out with the litigant in person.
Continued on page 6