MANY lawyers particularly barristers will heartily agree with your editorial comment (South China Morning Post, March 29) that, ''It is a disgrace that in the last decade of the 20th century Hongkong courts still function by methods that belong to the quill pen era''. To my personal knowledge, the profession (including the judiciary itself), has protested for 20 years or more against the system whereby High Court judges have to record evidence in civil cases in longhand. A judge's function is to judge and not to be a scribe. To judge properly he must hear the evidence, evaluate it in his mind as it is given, assess the demeanor and credibility of the witness, etc. It is extremely difficult for a judge to do this and at the same keep a longhand verbatim record of the evidence whilst allowing the case to proceed with reasonable dispatch. Some judges keep a verbatim record but proceedings move at a snail's pace. It is intensely frustrating attempting to cross-examine at slower than dictation speed. Other judges record the evidence in narrative form and the case proceeds slightly faster. But the record then is not a record of the witnesses' actual words but is the judge's summary. The contrast between the recording of evidence in civil and criminal cases is stark. A Rolls-Royce service is provided for criminal trials with full court reporting and proper transcripts for the purposes of appeals. However, in civil cases despite the provisions of the Rules of the Supreme Court which require an official shorthand note to be taken of the oral evidence, in the great majority of cases no court reporter is available and the judge has to keep his own longhand record of the evidence. Prior to the opening of the new Supreme Court building in Queensway the profession was assured that the problem would be solved with the new recording equipment that was to be installed. That equipment was installed, presumably at no little expense, but remains virtually unused for reasons no one seems able sufficiently to explain. In my view the absence of court reporters for the recording of civil cases undoubtedly has a major deterrent effect upon judicial recruitment. Lawyers who aspire to be appointed to the bench want to try cases. They do not want the drudgery of spending hours/ days/weeks writing down evidence in longhand and then later proofreading the transcription perhaps two or three times for the purposes of the appeal record. At the time when they are at the peak of a professional career they should not be expected to do the job of a clerk. Finally I wish to take issue with the reference in your editorial to a survey by a Mr James Allen which asserts that High Court judges manage ''to work only 3.27 hours a day''. I regret that I missed the article and any breakdown it contained as to how the figure was arrived that. However the obvious point that should be made is, of course, that normally more work is done out of court than actually sitting in court. This is because papers have to be read, law has to be researched and judgements have to bewritten before one even starts trying to keep up to date with new legislation, new reported cases, etc. Any lawyer who attempts to keep pace with the ever developing and increasingly complex law in Hongkong, quite apart from the UK and elsewhere, can never find enough time to do all the reading that should be done. R. J. MILLS-OWENS Q.C. Queensway I READ with interest the article headlined, ''Concern on brain drain as judges leave bench'', and the accompanying editorial on March 29. The large number of vacancies which will need to be filled in the next four years requires the Judicial Service Commission to seek innovative solutions to the problem. In December 1991, the Law Society submitted a proposal to the Chief Justice which would make solicitors with 10 or more years of experience eligible for direct appointment to the Supreme Court. This would greatly increase the pool of suitable and well-qualified local candidates. The Law Society's proposal deserves serious consideration. AMBROSE H. C. LAU President The Law Society of Hongkong
