When Australia was pondering its future as a Commonwealth the idea that we have a House of Lords was not favoured. It was not considered appropriate for the nation to create a class of aristocrats.

However the system gradually started to create a class of aristocrats, Lords and Barons to Lord it over us, and those of us who are essentially freedom loving have been chafing under the heavy yoke of the State. The people who should be protecting us from the State are lawyers, and they have fallen down on the job because they rather like some of their number to be elevated to the status of Lords and Masters.

Firstly convention, not a vote, has elevated the nine Parliaments in Australia to equal status, when the Constitution clearly states that the Parliament of the Commonwealth is paramount. Then convention developed in the legal profession, not within the general public, has decreed that a lawyer can be a Judge. A Judge was what was created by various tribes in the Old Testament, and was the ultimate Aristocrat. We have adopted this ancient custom, and the class is drawn exclusively from the legal profession, with all its faults and failings.

In 1900, there was a mechanism to sharpen the intellect of all lawyers, in that they had to be able to pass an examination in a court comprised of twelve ordinary people and a Justice before their will could be imposed upon an unwilling victim. This is no longer the case, and no civil examinations are held in public before 12 jurors, in most cases these days, and Judges make judgments on application from a lawyer. A careful examination of the law before 1900, shows that the ultimate power, then rested with a jury of twelve, and even legislation was subject to a thorough examination before it was applied. This kept Parliaments honest, much to their disgust, and lawyers were able to take a clients case, and if the law was bad, have it annulled. We would love our lawyers again, if they still did that

Pelican, that's a good idea. Or there is also the concept of litigation funding which has been approved in principle by the High Court, although I don't see how that would work for small matters.

Certainly, I've been conscious of the problem for a long time: it was the subject of one of my earliest posts.

http://skepticlawyer.com.au/2006/04/being-a-party-to-a-legal-action-2/

I realised that there's no way I could have afforded to hire myself at the charge out rates my firm used to charge (does that make sense?) Having recourse against people who refuse to perform a contract properly or cheat you or wrong you is a really important aspect of human rights. Private law really should oil the wheels of society so that we can all get along properly.