The construction of a first-class rule-of-law city emphasizes the role of lawyers.
On February 19, 2014, a delegation from the Shenzhen Lawyers Association, including President Zhang Yong, Vice Presidents Lin Xiaoqing and Zheng Degang, Council Members Ma Xueping, Xiao Hanmei, and Gu Donglin, and Supervisor Liu Jun, visited the Legislative Affairs Office of the Shenzhen Municipal People's Government. They were received by Wang Pu, Director of the Legislative Affairs Office; Jiang Xiaowen, Director of the Coordination Division; Huang Xiangzhao, Director of the Document Review Division; Wang Jun, Deputy Director of the Legal Affairs Division; and Ding Minggao, Researcher at the Research Institute. A symposium was held during the visit.
President Zhang Yong briefly introduced the recent work of our association: the Eighth Shenzhen Lawyers Association upholds the working philosophy of placing equal emphasis on both management and service. It has safeguarded lawyers' rights and interests by purchasing critical illness insurance for all lawyers in the city and promoting the establishment of a "green channel" for lawyers. It has also promulgated and implemented China's first operational code of professional ethics for lawyers——the Code of Professional Ethics of the Shenzhen Lawyers Association——to enhance the level of self-discipline in the legal profession and build a highly competitive team of lawyers. President Zhang Yong stated that in the new era, in order to further implement the spirit of the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee and unite more lawyers to better serve the building of a city under the rule of law, he hopes the government will provide support and guidance in advancing government procurement of legal services and universally establishing a legal counsel system, thereby opening up space for the development of the legal profession.
The participating lawyers put forward the following suggestions regarding government procurement of legal services and the universal establishment of a legal counsel system: First, unify the standards for government procurement of legal services at both the municipal and district levels, including designing standardized bidding and tendering rules tailored to such services and unifying the threshold amounts for procurement targets; Second, raise awareness of government procurement of legal services, promote the establishment of a legal counsel system across governments at all levels and their departments, fully leverage lawyers' professional advantages in major project construction, urban regional planning, and other areas, and form a synergistic force for building a city under the rule of law; Third, follow market value orientation, incorporate the procurement of legal services into fiscal budgets, and provide funding guarantees for improving the mechanism for government procurement of legal services.
Director Wang Pu pointed out that the implementation of the Regulations of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone on Lawyers, the first lawyers' legislation in China, has further promoted judicial justice and, to a certain extent, driven amendments to administrative law. The history of the legal profession in Shenzhen proves that lawyers are the elite of society, penetrating every level of social development and construction. They are a vital new force and an indispensable force that a city building an excellent rule-of-law environment should rely on and can count on to play an important role.
The Legislative Affairs Office of the Municipal Government places great emphasis on giving full play to the role of lawyers and will actively promote the following initiatives: First, listing "further implementing the decisions of the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee and promoting the universal establishment of a legal counsel system" as a key task of the Legislative Affairs Office in 2014, and recommending that the government issue documents to promote the establishment of legal counsel in governments at all levels and in all government departments; Second, when reviewing laws, regulations and relevant documents, all divisions and offices of the Legislative Affairs Office will seek the professional opinions of the Lawyers Association and lawyers, so as to further enhance the government’s level of law-based and science-based decision-making; Third, it is proposed that the Lawyers Association recommend legal experts in fields such as finance, real estate and corporate law to increase the proportion of lawyers in the expert pool, pooling wisdom from multiple sources to serve the government. It is hoped that the Lawyers Association will lead its team well, unite the broad community of lawyers in caring about and supporting law-based administration and science-based government decision-making, and provide valuable opinions and suggestions for building a city and government under the rule of law.
