Dubai, 11 December 2011: The Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department, the regulatory authority for the legal profession in Dubai, recently hosted a Continuing Professional Development workshop as part of its efforts to develop a comprehensive framework for accreditation and training of legal consultants and advocates in Dubai.
The seminar saw international and local legal practitioners engaging in discussions on the benefits and challenges of professional development. The participants also had an opportunity to learn about the objectives of the Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department and provide feedback on the Department's initiatives to develop a world-class environment for practising law in Dubai.
His Excellency Dr. Lowai Mohamed Belhoul, the Director General of the Department, said: "As the authority entrusted with regulating the legal profession in Dubai, the Department must take the lead in establishing competency benchmarks for the legal profession and ensuring the excellence of legal services offered to the public. Mandatory continuing professional development is well-established in many other legal jurisdictions and has been shown to contribute positively to developing a culture of ongoing professional development."
Implementing unified continuing professional development standards in Dubai involves complex internal and external challenges as practitioners come from different backgrounds and their exposure to professional development often varies from one extreme to the other. The Department is currently exploring ways to establish a competitive and well-balanced legal professional development programme aligned to global best practices and the local market.
Dr Belhoul added: "We are keen to initiate and sustain dialogue with legal practitioners and the private sector so that any reform in this sector is well-aligned to the local society and economy. Dubai's growth and its increasingly diverse resident and business communities make such dialogue and partnerships essential to finding a common starting point for such reforms."
As part of the efforts to assess the current level of continuing professional development in Dubai, the Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department had conducted preliminary surveys among law firms and practitioners. Findings from these surveys were shared with participants in the workshop. The findings reflect that, at least amongst the legal consultants in Dubai who responded to the survey, continuing professional development is already part of the professional culture to some degree. However, many of those who responded indicated that wider access to high quality courses was necessary, including access to training in local laws.
Mark Beer, Registrar of the DIFC Courts, who was the opening speaker at the workshop, explored the benefits of continuing professional development to firms, individual lawyers, and to the professional community and the broader business community as a whole, and challenged the audience to consider questions such as why continuing professional development should be mandatory, how to ensure consistency and quality, how to bring all lawyers up to a minimum standard, how to avoid bureaucracy, and how to minimise cost.
Dr. Mohammed Al Kamali, General Director of the Institute of Training and Judicial Studies, and Dr. Jamal Al Sumaiti, Director General, Dubai Judicial Institute, described some of the professional legal training offered at their respective institutions, and the challenges in offering such training.
Dr. Al Kamali praised the role of the Legal Affairs Department in spreading awareness on the importance of continuous training, pointing out that there will be close cooperation with the Department in this framework in order to promote a culture of continuing professional training, convince all lawyers and legal advisers on the need to undergo training and continuous development, and provide them access to continuing professional development.
He also emphasised the importance of holding such workshops to communicate and interact directly with practitioners in the legal field, identify their needs and provide them with the knowledge and practical experiences that would encourage them to engage actively in training and professional development on an ongoing basis.
Dr. Al Sumaiti also commended the efforts of the Legal Affairs Department in Dubai in spreading awareness of the importance of continuing legal professional training. He said that reviewing the practical experiences in the workshop will contribute significantly to nurturing a culture of training and development among legal practitioners and introduce them to the positive implications of this concept in performing their work competently and professionally.
The first panel session looked into the benefits of continuing professional development and the best approaches that would motivate practitioners to step forward and take ownership of ongoing professional development. The role of regulation in encouraging professional development was part of the discussion but the focus was on the input from legal firms and practitioners.
The second panel session deliberated on cultivating a culture of professional development programmes within legal firms, irrespective of their size and composition. Legal firms that already have internal training programmes shared their experiences with setting up such programmes.
At the end of the workshop Dr. Belhoul stressed the keenness of the Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department to launch effective initiatives for advancing professional development. The Department is working on designing and implementing a programme for the development of the legal profession in line with international best practices and the application of clear criteria. The programme will especially help bridge the cultural and knowledge gap between international and local legal practitioners and enhance competencies of UAE citizens, contributing to sustainable development in the UAE.
-Ends-
About the Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department
The Government of Dubai Legal Affairs Department was established by Dubai Law No (32) of 2008. One of its mandates is to license, monitor and regulate the legal profession in Dubai, and to implement legislation in this regard. In addition, the Department is also responsible for drafting and reviewing legislation; licensing and regulating legal consultancy and advocacy firms; reviewing government contracts; providing legal opinion; and receiving complaints and lawsuits filed against the government bodies as well as a range of other responsibilities.
For more information please contact:
Nedal Alasaad/Nizar Aridi
ASDA'A Burson-Marsteller
Tel: (971 4) 4507600
Fax: (971 4) 4358040
Email: n.alasaad@asdaa.com / n.aridi@asdaa.com
© Press Release 2011
