Legal support in the legal consulting system: meanings and forms

Important directions of substantiation of the legal consulting role in the legal economy encompass solving a problem of whether a legal services business is a form of legal support and, if so, what peculiarities it has.

Recent research and publications analysis. Professional legal support is a form of juridical practice, which consists of the following directions: conducting a case; interpretation of legal texts; advising on legal matters; representation of the economic entity interests in the process of consideration of a case at various public and non-public organizations and institutions. Providing legal support, legal consulting entities professionally assist economic agents in solving certain legal problems, conduces to dissemination of legal knowledge and the increase of legal awareness and culture. Nowadays, representatives of either economics or the legal science do not pay significant notice to the place and the role of legal consulting in the system of legal servicing, development of which provides access to justice to citizens. This is an up-to-date problem of enhancement of the legal economy in Ukraine.

Paper objective. An article purpose is to disclose inherent peculiarities of legal support provided by legal consulting entities to economic agents.

Paper main body. Contemporary normative, scientific, and applied sources contain certain terms such as legal support, professional services of lawyers, juridical support characterizing professional work of solicitors and lawyers. The author proposes to indicate the two main approaches to defining the mentioned terms. The first one is drawing distinctions between the terms. The second one is identification of one term with the others.

The Law of Ukraine “On Free Legal Support” determines that legal aid is providing legal support aimed at fulfillment of rights and liberties of a human and a citizen, protection of these rights and liberties, and restoration of them in case of violation. According to this Law, legal support encompass the following professional work of lawyers: providing legal information, advising, and explanation of legal matters; preparation of petitions, claims, procedural documents, and other legal documents; representation of the person's interests in courts, at other public bodies, bodies of local self-governance, before other parties; providing defense of a person against accusation; providing assistance to a person concerned with access to secondary legal support and mediation (“On Free Legal Support”, 2011). Za- borovskyi (2016) states, “the Civil Procedure Code of Ukraine, the Code of Administrative Procedure of Ukraine, the Code on Administrative Violations of Ukraine, the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine actively apply a term “legal support” for identification of professional activity of a defense attorney. It is worth mentioning that indicated procedure codes apply solely a term “legal support” to refer to such activity. Nevertheless, the Economic Procedure Code of Ukraine applies a term “support of an attorney”. In this context, legal support is referred to as provision of various legal services by lawyers, particularly by attorneys.

The Law of Ukraine “On Amendment of the Constitution of Ukraine (regarding justice)” of 02 June 2016 No. 1401-VIII substituted the concept “professional services of lawyers” for the term “legal support” in Article 59 of the Constitution of Ukraine (“On Amendment of the Constitution of Ukraine (regarding justice)”, 2016). The Constitution of Ukraine states that “each person is eligible for professional services of lawyers. In cases prescribed by law, this support is provided on the pro bono basis. Everyone is free to choose a defender of rights” (“Constitution of Ukraine”, 1996). Unlike the term “legal support”, the concept “professional services of lawyers” highlights a source of legal support for a population, entrepreneurs, public institutions, and non-profit organizations. This source is legal professionals. The author emphasizes that Article 10 of the Law of Ukraine “On the Judiciary and the Status of Judges” determines attorneys as the only source of professional legal support. The Article states that “professional legal support is provided by advocacy. An attorney, except for case prescribed by law, provides rights to defense against criminal accusation and represents a person in court” (“On the Judiciary and the Status of Judges”, 2016 ). The author notices that professional services regarding legal matters may not be an exclusive function of an attorney (a representative, a defender). Professional services consist in representation in court and defense of a subject of law as well as advising on different legal matters, interpretation of normative acts, legal support of economic activity of neutral and legal persons, preparation of certain documents, etc. Consequently, attorneys should not be considered as the only source of professional services of lawyers.

Khmelevska (2012) defines juridical support as “support, which is aimed at providing fulfillment, protection, or restoration of certain rights or liberties of a human, a citizen, and a person and are stipulated by legislation, legal norms and/or practical application of norms and clarified in the legal science. The normative sense of juridical support implies permanent provision of juridical support to humans, citizens, and persons only in conformity with the certain indicated and legislatively regulated framework” (рр. 145-146). The term of juridical support specified the jurisprudential sense of professional activity of lawyers is oriented towards support of natural and legal persons in solving legal problems.

Thus, drawing distinctions between the considered terms is related to application of different criteria regarding ascertainment of the sense of professional work of lawyers concerned with fulfillment and protection of rights and liberties of citizens and organizations. Therefore, the author indicates the following peculiarities of the above-mentioned concepts: a) a process of providing legal support refers to legal support; b) lawyers as a source of legal support refer to professional services of lawyers; c) a certain legal service, which discloses the jurisprudential sense of particular legal support, refers to juridical support.

An example of identification of one considered term with the others is the following definition of legal support: “Legal (lawyers”, juridical) support are professional activity of lawyers aimed at facilitating citizens and legal entities in solving problems related to fulfillment of legal norms, which occur in the form of providing legal (juridical) support (Wikipedia). In the view of activity of attorneys, Za- borovskyi (2016) points out that a term of support is the key element in distinguishing concepts “legal support”, “juridical support”, and “lawyer”s support”. Thus, it is possible to use each of these concepts for characterizing activity of attorneys. Anikeiev (2012) defines juridical support as a type of law enforcement activity and emphasizes that terms “juridical support” and “legal support” may be applied as equivalent (р. 129). The author thinks that concepts of legal support, professional services of lawyers, and juridical support disclose different connotations of provision of support to natural and legal persons by lawyers in solving legal problems. These connotations may be divided into the following levels:

- a social level: legal support as legal aid. Social support is a complex of measures on providing assistance to persons or certain social groups, who are in difficult circumstances and cannot overcome them on their own in order to solve their problems of life (“On Social Support”, 2003);

- a professional level: professional services of lawyers;

- an explicit practical level: juridical support.

If we take into account the social sense of practical legal activity in the process of its characterizing, professional services of a lawyer are legal support. If we take into account a subject (a source of legal support), practical legal activity is professional services of lawyers (because an expert in law provides legal support). If we take into account the jurisprudential and normative sense of a certain legal service, it is juridical support. Firstly, concepts “legal support”, “juridical support”, and “professional services of lawyers” are interrelated, but they are not synonyms, since they describe different levels of practical legal activity. Secondly, the term “juridical support” is more accurate for defining professional work of entities of legal consulting. It adequately describes nature of relations between an adviser and a customer in the process of legal consulting (a customer - a particular natural or legal person, a source - a qualified lawyer, a legal service - professional work of a lawyer in the area of the legal science concerned with solving a certain legal problem).

Professional legal support may be free or payable for those needing or providing it.

The government guarantees legal aid for natural persons and entirely or partially finances it at the expense of funds of the State Budget of Ukraine, local budgets, and other sources. In Article 3 of the Law of Ukraine “On Free Legal Support”, the Parliament establishes a right to legal aid as an opportunity for a Ukrainian citizen, a foreigner, a stateless person, including a refugee, or a person needing additional protection to obtain entirely free primary legal support guaranteed by the Constitution and an opportunity of a certain group of persons to obtain free secondary legal support in cases determined by this Law (“On Free Legal Support”, 2011).

This Law divides legal aid into the following types:

- primary - a type of government guarantee, which consists in informing a person about rights and liberties, a procedure of their fulfillment, restoration in case of violation, and a procedure of appealing against decisions, actions, or inactivity of public authorities, bodies of local self-governance, and governmental officials. Primary legal aid includes providing legal information, advising, and explanation of legal matters, preparation of applications, claims, and other legal documents (except procedural documents), support of providing access of a person to secondary legal aid and mediation;

- secondary - a type of government guarantee, which consists in formation of equal opportunities for access of persons to justice. Secondary legal aid includes the following services: defense; representation of the interests of persons being eligible for secondary legal aid in courts and at other public authorities, bodies of local self-governance, before other persons; preparation of procedural documents.

Thus, legal aid (primary and secondary) for natural persons is a state guarantee providing equal access of a population to legal knowledge and information, fulfillment and protection of their rights and liberties. It is worth mentioning that such legal aid is free for a customer. Legal aid is funded from the state and local budgets. Since a process of legal assistance implies costs for information, preparation of documents, etc., legal aid is resource-intensive.

Having analyzed meaning of legal aid for natural persons, the author may assert that legal consulting has nothing to do with legal aid, because it is contrary to entrepreneurial activity related to provision of legal services. Nowadays, pro bono consulting activity (Latin, “pro bono publico” - for the public good) rapidly develops. Pro bono is a voluntary free non-reimbursable professional work of lawyers based on principles of social efficiency and collaboration with social organizations, which is concerned with provision of legal assistance to persons, who need it, but have no possibility of obtaining legal services because of limited financial, social, and other capacities. Pro bono legal practices, which help indigent persons and non-profit organizations overcome current obstacles for access to legal knowledge, professional legal support, and justice, are important components of programs for social responsibility of legal services business.

It should be noted that рш bono legal services significantly differ from:

- legal aid (primary and secondary), which is a state guarantee in Ukraine and is funded from the state and local budgets. Consumers do not pay for pro bono legal services as well as legal aid. Expenses of lawyers for providing these services are not compensated. Pro bono is free for a consumer and non-compensable for a lawyer. In contrast to legal aid, provision of “pro bono” services is a voluntary choice of a lawyer or a legal services firm. Provision of legal aid by entities, obligations of which are determined by the current legislation, is mandatory;

- charitable activity of lawyers and legal services firms. Pro bono legal services are a wide range of professional services conforming to all requirements and criteria of practical legal activity rather than one-time charitable events or programs. Although pro bono services are free of charge and non-compensable for lawyers, they are not charitable activity of firm staff. Pro bono is a permanent professional activity related to provision of legal assistance to those segments of a population, who have limited access to justice. Conducting such activity is a criterion of professional and social responsibility of legal business entities.

Self-employed persons such as attorneys, notaries, and public institutions can provide payable legal support. Unlike activity of entities of legal consulting, this payable professional legal support is not aimed at earning profit.

Conclusions. Thus, legal consulting conducing to solving legal problems of natural and legal persons is a component of a system of legal support as an important element of the legal economy, which develops in Ukraine. Legal support provided by legal consulting entities has social, professional, and explicit practical level. Juridical support more accurately defines this process. Legal consulting services as payable legal support differ from payable legal services of self-employed persons and public institutions in a purpose of earning profit. Free legal assistance in the legal consulting sphere is carried out in the form of pro bono legal practices, development of which provides fulfillment of the social role and social responsibility of the legal services business in provision of access of a population to justice.

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