The Gazette 1946-49

applicant applied for an order requiring delivery of a detailed bill in respect of work for which a gross sum had been charged in 1940. No applica– tion to have the costs taxed had been made within twelve months of delivery of the demand. The work charged for in the gross sum included negotia– tion of a loan secured by mortgage which was not secured by freehold or leasehold land within the jurisdiction. The net point for decision was whether the costs attracted the scale fee in which case they would be outside clause 2 (

for payment by a gross sum or otherwise between solicitors and their clients do not apply to criminal proceedings. The Act is expressly excluded from applying to costs coming within the Solicitors' Remuneration Act, 1881, by section 9 of the latter Act. The Attornies and Solicitors' Act, 1870, has always been regarded as applying to Ireland, but his Lordship was not quite clear that it did so apply. (The Act is an important one, and if it were judicially held inapplicable to this country, the established practice of the last eighty years would be upset. It is hoped that any existing doubts will be removed in the Solicitors' Bill.) (3) A person who has been convicted of a felony, whose retrial has been ordered by the Court of Criminal Appeal, may notwithstanding the provision of the Forfeiture Act, 1870, enter into a valid agree– ment with his solicitor as to costs, at any time subsequent to the order for the new trial, and before his subsequent conviction, as the original conviction is quashed pending the result of the new trial. From this reasoning it would seem that a convict to whom the disabilities'of the Forfeiture Act, 1870, apply is incapable of entering into a valid contract with his solicitor as to the costs of his defence, and that unless either payment or an agreement therefor has been made before conviction the costs may be irrecoverable. (4) There is no act in Ireland corresponding to the English Costs in Criminal Cases, 1908, and there is no prescribed scale of costs in. criminal cases in either the District Court, the Circuit Court or the Court of Criminal Appeal. The Court, however, has jurisdiction over such costs as part of its jurisdiction over its own officers, and the most convenient way of dealing with them in the absence of prescribed scales is to send them to a Taxing Master for a report. This procedure is analogous to that laid down by R.S.C. (Ir.), 1905, O. LXV. r. 65 (25). EXAMINATION RESULTS At the Preliminary Examination for intending apprentices to Solicitors held on the gth and loth days of April, the following passed the examination and their names are arranged in order of merit: 1. Patrick J. McCormack.

2. Patrick J. Creagh. 3. Patrick N. Downes. 4. Patrick J. Cusack. 5. Thomas P. Kelly. Seven candidates attended :

five passed;

two

were postponed.

Final Examination At

the Final Examination for apprentices to Solicitors held on the i st and znd April, the following 75-3