The government will publish a draft law to regulate the legal profession in the next few weeks, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici said.
He said that following consultations with the Chamber of Advocates, the government had made progress on the Lawyers' Act aimed an ensuring that lawyers were competent and had integrity by, for example, ensuring continuous professional development. Such a law is in place in other EU countries.
Dr Bonnici added that it was also time to review the code of ethics of lawyers to cater for the use of social media. It was also time to debate the subject of advertising for lawyers (currently prohibited) and, perhaps, look at allowing new lawyers to indicate that they had become lawyers.
Dr Bonnici was speaking during a seminar at the Chamber of Advocates' offices, located within the Law Courts in Valletta.
Dr Bonnici said he was glad to see collaboration between the chamber, the ministry and the University of Malta's Faculty of Laws. He urged law students to consider embarking on a career with the government - saying this was not limited to working with the Attorney General's office as a range of legal services were needed in ministries, authorities and agencies.
He also spoke about the ongoing reform to the legal aid system adding that it would be interesting to discuss allowing students to carry out their legal practice with legal aid lawyers - where they would learn to understand and appreciate social realities.
Reuben Balzan said that about 300 lawyers from the 1,000 or so went to court regularly. Many lawyers were working in other fields including financial services.
David Zammit, head of the Department of Civil Law, said that clinical law teaching started in the US and spread across the world. This was based on the concept that students learn best when they would practice what they learnt under supervision.
The Faculty of Law started embracing this idea in 2007 since when it taught students, oral advocacy, advocacy skills through lectures and role plays and supervised practice.