Emergency guidelines on rights of suspects to have solicitor at police interviews issued

EMERGENCY guidelines on the rights of police suspects to have a solicitor present during an initial interview have been updated to stop them conflicting with the Scottish solicitors' code of conduct.

A series of meetings between the Law Society, Scottish Government, Crown Office, Scottish Legal Aid Board and police have seen the interim rules amended to avoid discontent among lawyers over proposals that they take instructions from police officers instead of directly from the person under suspicion.

That stipulation would have seen attending solicitors breach a fundamental tenet of their code of conduct that decrees that they have an absolute obligation to their client.

The agreement is the latest stage in a struggle among the legal profession and lawmakers in Scotland to ensure criminal procedures comply with an anticipated change in the law that could deem police suspects are entitled to have a lawyer present during any interview.

Human Rights law in the UK is set to be altered in the wake of a case brought by Peter Cadder in the Supreme Court in which he claims he should have been entitled to legal representation in a police interview in which he confessed to assault.

That case prompted the Lord Advocate to issue interim guidance on police interviews in order to minimise future costs, after fears were raised that 100,000 criminal cases in Scotland could be reviewed, leaving authorities open to compensation claims.

The Law Society of Scotland met recently with the deans and presidents of bar associations and faculties across Scotland to discuss the amended guidelines, and has now voiced concerns that the speed with which they were introduced has led to a lack of information about how they operate in practice. The Society has asked its members to give it feedback on the changes.

In an update to its members, Society officials revealed that they had made representations to the Scottish Government over the rates of pay for solicitors attending police interviews and managed to have the guidelines amended to remove subsumption for out-of-hours work.

The Law Society also warned the Scottish Government had emphasised the anticipated public sector budget squeeze was likely to have an impact. And it said a further revision of the rules - likely to be laid before parliament in the new session - was inevitable after the outcome of the Cadder case was known.

It added: "As the decision of the Supreme Court is not yet available, albeit certain educated guesses can be made, there remains a degree of uncertainty about how our procedures and legal aid system will look in the aftermath of Cadder."