The Gazette 1907-8

23

The Gazette of the Incorporated Law Society of Ireland.

JUNK, 1907]

eight cottages to be built, and fences to be erected round ninety plots of land, the total costs of the scheme being approximately ^8950, and the total amount of the contract prices for buildings and fences was ^4274. The solicitor prepared a common form of agreement bond and warrant applicable to every case, with blanks for the names of the contractor, and his sureties and the contract price and site of the proposed works, and got them printed. There were 113 accepted tenders, many of them sent in by the same contractor, and a separate contract was signed for each accepted tender. The solicitor's costs of the scheme were taxed, an independent solicitor attending on the taxation on behalf of the District Council. There was included in the costs and allowed on taxation a bulk fee of £2 zs. for the preparation and execution of the agreement bond and warrant in the case of each of 113 accepted tenders. The Local Government Board Auditor re duced the taxed bills by the sum of £67 16$., and in his certificate of surcharge stated he was of opinion that the employment of a solicitor for the purpose of performing what he regarded as the purely clerical duty of filling up the blanks in the printed forms of agree ment was unnecessary and the payment thereof unfounded, and he therefore disallowed i zs. on each of the r 13 items of £z 2s., measuring the sum of izs. by reference to a previous audit in a different district. The Auditor further stated that in former schemes in that district similar contracts had been filled up by the clerk or his assistant. The powers of Auditors contained in sect. 12 of Irish Local Government Act, 1871, and sect. 20 of the Irish Local Government Act, 1902, were fully discussed. The Labourers Act, 1906, had not been passed, and, there fore, did not apply: Held unanimously (Kenny, J., expressing doubt, but assenting), that there being no illegality in the contract between the Council and the solicitor, and no suggestion of fraud, collusion, misconduct, or neglect, and the costs having been taxed by the appropriate officer, the Taxing Master, and an independent soli citor having attended the taxation on behalf of the Council, the employment and payment of a solicitor in this case was not " misconduct or negligence," on the part of the members of the Council authorizing such employment, and the auditor's surcharge disallowing the pay ment to the solicitor was overruled.

COURT OF APPISAI. (ENGLAND). (Before Alverstone, C.J.; Fletcher Moulton, and Buckley, L.JJ.). Clare v. Joseph. May 2nd, 1907.— Solicitor—Costs—Oral agree ment— Validity against Solicitor — Solicitors Act, 1870 (33 & 34 Vict., c. 28), s. 4. A SOLICITOR made an oral agreement with his client, who was the plaintiff in an action, that if the action was successful the client should pay no costs, leaving the solicitor to recover his costs from the other party to the action, and if the action was unsuccessful the client should only pay to the solicitor such costs as the latter would have been entitled to receive from the other party if the action had been successful. The client was successful in the action. The solicitor, who had received the taxed party and party costs from the other party to the action, claimed to recover from the client the difference between solicitor and client costs and the party and party costs received. The client set up the above agree ment : Held, that, as the client set up the agree ment, it was not required to be in writing under section 4 of the Solicitors Act, 1870, and was therefore binding upon the solicitor. Reported in T.L.R., Vol. xxm.,'page 498.

KING'S BENCH DIVISION. 9//z May, 1907.

Gibson and Kenny,

(Before O'Brien, C.J. ;

"JJ-) The King (Kenned)'} v. Cyril Broivne. Taxed Costs—Revision-by Local Government Board Auditor. THE Rural District Council of Ennis em ployed their solicitor to prepare agreements bonds and warrants in relation to tin; erection of labourers' cottages, and of fences in . connexion therewith, such agreements consti tuting the contracts between the Council and their building contractors. There were twenty-