The Gazette 1967/71

enactment of new legislation preferably of a much more flexible nature which would permit further modifications being made in the system as circumstances in future times might require. Quite obviously it was pointless to promote such legislation until the report on the com mission and the attitude of the Government to it became known. That as you know did not happen until late last year. This obstacle has now been removed but there is one further matter which must be dealt with. At present we have in the city of Dublin alone four law schools. I think I am expressing a view which would be shared by most of you that this is a most wasteful and inefficient arrangement, which serves no useful purpose. None of these law schools are big enough to afford complete permanent whole-time staffing and adequate tutorial facilities. The obvious answer is that there should be one law school which would cater for the theoretical aspects of legal education. Such a school staffed with who'ctimc professors and lecturers would have the added advantage of providing a nucleus for legal research which is con spicuously absent in this country and which is so very important particularly in these times of rapid develop ment and the approach or more intimate contact with legal systems of other countries. With this in view the Society has approached the other institutions and a meeting is to take place within the next two weeks. I should mention under this heading the spectacular increase in the number of apprentices in the last two years. Entrants are now running at over 100 per annum as against a wasteage of approximately 30. We may assume that almost all of these students will one day be solicitors and if this trend continues and unless there is dramatic increase and unless so'icitors are struck with some fatal epidemic peculiar to their profession there is going to be a gross oversupply on the market in four or five years hence and in the years following. We have no right to restrict entry to our profession not have we any wish to do so. The door is open to everyone. But I would direct the attention of intending students, parents and career guidance officers to these facts and suggest that before a student seeks apprenticeship he should famil iarise himself with these statistics by consulting Mr. Plunkett and his staff. THE FUTURE OF THE PROFESSION AND THE SOCIETY During my term I have visited most of the Bar Asso ciations in Ireland and I have been struck by the far.' that the accessibility of solicitors in all parts of Ireland even the most remote. In every part of Ireland the people can call upon the services of a solicitor who has his office at an easy distance from their homes and whom they know personally. This led me to consider how im portant this is for the proper working of our democratic process. In our conception of democracy it is funda mental that every person should stand equal before the law. If this is to be so he must have effective access to the machinery of law enforcement, namely the courts. This function the solicitor ideally fulfills. He is com pletely independent and not only is independent but appears to be so; he therefore enjoys the confidence and respect of his client who knows that he owes no loyalty and is beholden to no one except to his client. In the case of superior courts he channels the client to suitable counsel and in many of the inferior courts he carries out the entire business himself. None of these courts in parti cular the inferior courts could work at all in the absence of a solicitors profession because there can be no substi tute for a completely independent solicitor enjoying the

advanced and the fast approaching date can be looked forward to with confidence. We have been very fortu nate in enjoying the help and co-operation of the Govern ment who are giving a reception, of the Chief Justice and the President of the High Court who have re arranged Court Sittings to suit the programme for the week, the Benchers of the Kings Inns who very gener ously made their premises available, our own apprentices and young solicitors who have provided a complete con stituency of stewards and staff, and of course Bord Faille who have been most helpful. Apart from the formal business of the conference a very full social pro gramme has been arranged. The principal events of which are the reception at the Four Courts and Kings Inns on Monday night, the reception to be given by the Government on Tuesday night at the Castle, an Irish evening on Wednesday night, a visit to the theatre on Thursday night, and concluding banquet and ball at Castletown House on Friday night in addition to which there is a full programme of entertainment for the ladies and coach tours for all the conferees. In addition to arranging all these matters the committee have had to provide the entire facilities for the conduct of the con ference itself in the Royal Dublin Society's premises at Ballsbridge. With all the complexities which a multi lingual conference of such a large proportion is involved we are all greatly indebted, I more than anybody, to Mr. Carrigan and the members of the committee and Mr. Hunkett and hope and pray that their labours will be crowned with the success which they deserve. LEGAL EDUCATION The present system of education of apprentices, what ever may be said for its suitability for earlier times is quite unsuited to the requirements of the present time and is extremely unsatisfactory. It has been the subject of adverse comment from many quarters and in many of these criticisms there is an underlying inference that the Society and its Council have neither been alive to these defects nor concerned to initiate the necessary reform. Nothing could be further from the truth. It also seems to be thought that the Society has the power within itself to carry out the necessary reforms. I want to correct both of these misconceptions. It is over seven years ago since the Council after careful study, prepared a com plete and detailed plan for a new programme of educa tion of apprentices. That plan was submitted in the form of recommendation to the Commission on Higher Educa tion; the full text may be found in the appendix to the report of that commission. I am also glad to say that these recommendations were accepted almost without qualification by the commission in its report. It is of interest to note that two further studies on this subject were produced, one by the Society of Young Solicitors six years later in November 1967 and one by the appren tices themselves in the same year. Both were prepared apparently independently of one another and without knowledge of the contents of the Council's recommenda tions of 1961. The conclusions arrived at differ only in unessential detail. The Council were of the view and still are that the defects are fundamental and are not to be remedied by some modification of syllabi, it needs rather a complete reconstruction of the entire system from beginning to end. It is in this that the difficulty lies. The present system of education is described in considerable detail in part four of the Solicitors Act, 1954, and the second schedule. The reforms which the Society have in mind as contained in their memorandum of 1961 would involve the repeal of Part 4 and the