Kerry Underwood balks at the transformation of legal “clients” into “consumers”
The Legal Ombudsman investigates, and seeks to resolve, complaints about the service provided by lawyers.
In his March 2012 report he states that the term client “embodies the traditional view of the relationship between lawyers and those they represent” and that the “notion of a consumer turns this relationship on its head. In most businesses, the consumer has the power and can choose which services to buy from which provider”.
Consumer crisis?
The Ombudsman’s suggestion is that many of the perceived problems with lawyers could be solved by a change of name and culture; everything will be fine if we are all consumers, conveniently ignoring the dreadful service that we consumers get from the banks, the utilities, insurance companies etc.
The attempt to turn all clients, patients, pupils, parishioners, passengers, constituents, readers, theatre-goers, etc into consumers is Orwellian. It equates law, medicine, teaching, religion, democracy and the rule of law itself to the equivalent of a packet of cornflakes. For many
