Justice Minister Jonathan Attard has said that the government will consider making changes to the law if an impasse surrounding a fit and proper test for aspiring lawyers to get their warrant to be able to practice is not solved.

The test in question has been criticised – including by Attard – as being excessive, as it demands a significant amount of personal detail which many feel should not have anything to do with the granting of a warrant.

In a letter to the President of Malta George Vella, who presides over the Commission for the Administration of Justice – under the remit of which the committee which handles new warrants falls under, Attard said that the impasse is stopping over 100 fully qualified lawyers and legal procurators from getting their warrant.

Attard referred the President to a communication sent by the secretary of the Commission for the Administration of Justice – a communication which he said only came to his attention from third parties.

In that email, he said, it was communicated to candidates for a warrant to practice as a lawyer and legal procurator that they cannot pass the fit and proper scrutiny process due to “shortcomings attributed to myself.”

Attard said that he is convinced that what has been expressed in this communication does not reflect the discussions held between the ministry and the Commission for the Administration of Justice on 27 March this year.

Attard said that during that meeting he had expressed his preoccupation at the situation and explained his reservations and objections for that which was being proposed by the Committee for Advocates and Legal Procurators.

Following this, as was agreed, the Justice Ministry had also advised what the reservations and objections were formally and informally in an effort for the same Commission to try and break the impasse.

“The Ministry still holds the belief that the information which the Committee for Advocates and Legal Procurators is asking for from candidates who have applied for a warrant is excessive and does not respect the dignity of the individuals and their privacy, to the point that it will leave an effect which discourages people from moving towards the legal profession,” Attard wrote.

He wrote that while reaffirming the Ministry’s commitment to improving professional standards, he can never agree that to receive a warrant one has to declare, amongst other things, whether they suffer from a physical disability, whether they’d gone through a mental illness in the previous decade, whether they had gone through any addictions in the past decade even if they have now recovered, whether they are subject to a civil case – including of a familial nature, and also – what Attard to be the most “unexplainable” -  where they attended primary school.

The Justice Minister therefore appealed for the deadlock to be broken “before we have to consider legislative intervention for justice to be done with the 105 people who have already been examined, approved, have the qualifications, and are competent to practice as lawyers and legal procurators in the Courts of Malta.”

Attard said that because the correspondence from the Commission’s secretary was circulated to third persons, the letter he was writing would also be made public.