President perspectives: Anthony Holland
We look back at the experiences of some of the former presidents of the Law Society – elected office holders who have acted as our main ambassadors and represented the organisation at home and abroad.
Anthony Holland was president from 1990 to 1991, and was knighted in 2003 for his work as chairman of the parades commission for Northern Ireland.
He tells us about his term – from guests at the president’s house, to what he did with his one free evening in the entire year.
During your presidency, what was your biggest highlight?
I was elected to Council in 1976, representing both Cornwall and Plymouth Law Societies.
When I became president in 1990, my wife and I decided to live in the Law Society president’s house at 60 Carey Street.
We had two dinners and three lunches every week and an invitation to them was highly regarded by the senior judiciary, politicians and others. Indeed the Foreign Office sometimes used the dinners as a way of unofficially entertaining some of their guests as well.
I can recall Margaret Thatcher coming to lunch on one occasion.
What was the biggest challenge you and the Law Society faced during the year?
The biggest challenge related to solicitors’ then ‘conveyancing monopoly’ which many in parliament wished to overturn, to open up conveyancing work to non-solicitors.
They eventually succeeded in eroding many of its features.
What was the biggest success during your year?
An important issue in the long term related to our rights of audience in the higher courts.
I represented a West Country constituency where advocacy was a strong feature of practice, primarily because of the historical absence of a local Bar in the early days beyond Bristol.
Inevitably that meant that I disagreed with the Council's historic position of not pressing for higher rights of audience for solicitors, as did a number of other Council members.
As then chair of the Non-contentious Committee, I proposed that the Council should change its policy, and Rodger Pannone as chair of the Contentious Committee seconded the motion. The Council then passed it.
That step-change resulted in today's plethora of solicitor advocates and silks.
What was the biggest surprise during the year?
I was surprised by how fully-filled every single day was as president. I recall having only one free night during the whole year. I used it to go to the cinema to see the film Dances with Wolves!
What three words would you use to describe your time as president?
It was such a privileged to be president. My three words are: ‘a unique honour’.