The Gazette 1967/71

PROFESSIONAL NEGLIGENCE INSURANCE In his address last November Mr. McCarron dealt at some length with the problem of professional negligence insurance. I am very pleased to be able to confirm that our Insurance Brokers, Messrs. Coyle & Co. have been able to arrange extremely favourable terms for a group Insurance Scheme with the Federated Employers Insurance Association Ltd. The Policv will cover Employers Liability, Public Liabilitv. Familv Legal Liability and, most important, professional liability. I have no doubt that when members learn the terms of the policy and other details thev will be anxious to ioin the group and of course the success of the scheme does depend on a sufficiently large response being obtained. The Administration of the Scheme will be by Irish Underwriting Agencies Ltd. and each Solicitors Insurance wlil be dealt with individually through the Insurance Broker of his choice. You will all have received a circular and further information will be available through the Secretariat or your local Bar Association. THE SOCIETY'S GAZETTE I hope that that members will appreciate the changes being made in the Gazette. Soon you will find that it will have a new cover and we hope that this is symbolic of a fresh approach under the editorship of Mr. Colm Gavan Duffy who has been to London to discuss the whole project with the Editor of the English Law Society Gazette. Mr. Gavan Duffy has been provided with an Assistant in the Library which relieves him of certain routine administrative duties and which I hope improves the service of members. LIAISON COMMITTEE The Court of Examiners has on several occasions met the elected representatives of the Solicitors Apprentices on the Liaison Committee set up last year. We have had full and frank discussions about the problems of the students and have considered carefully all suggestions made by them. The atmosphere at these meetings has always been most friendly and I very much hope that the results will justify the establishment of the Comittee. KING'S HOSPITAL We are still uncertain of the precise date on which we shall get possession of Kings Hospital but I think it right that the members of the profession should know that quite apart from the formidable capital sum required to make these magnificent premises suitable for our needs, we shall very shortly be faced with heavy cost of upkeep and maintenance. For some time these costs will be in addition to the cost of maintaining our present building and in future are likely to be on an increased scale which will certainly involve a higher subscription. The special Kings Hospital Committee is hard at work considering these and other problems with the help of the Finance Committee and in co-operation with our Architect, Town Planning Consultant and other professional advisors. This whole project is a

challenge and an expression of faith in the future of this profession. INTERNATIONAL BAR ASSOCIATION You will remember that in 1968 the Twelfth Biennial Conference of the Association was held in Dublin and this Society was the Host Organisation in Association with the General Council of the Bar. It was generally agreed that the Conference was a tremendous success and the Council has decided that it is right and proper that we should be represented at the Thirteenth Conference to be held in Japan at the end of August. I have just returned from two days in Palma as a member of the Committee which had the task of arranging the Agenda of the Conference in Tokyo. The Law Society of England has chartered two planes to take European delegates to Japan and I hope to attend the conference with one or two others from Ireland who are able to make this long journey. I shall report to you at the end of my year of Office. It is hoped that the 1972 Conference will be in the Netherlands and no doubt many of our members will be anxious to attend. In view of certain recent statements about the necessity for the formation of a Solicitors Union I think it right to reiterate the fact that since 1965 the Incorporated Law Society has had excepted body status under the Trade LTnion Act 1941 and is there fore empowered to negotiate on behalf of members of the profession who may need to be represented in respec.t of any claim or dispute concering salaries and conditions of employment in the service of Local Government Auhorities and analarous bodies. A glance at the annual report of the Council will show that the activities of the Society on behalf of its members and of the nublic are manifo'd and are bv no means confined to the purely statutory functions of registration and discipline. The suggestion in the press that the law was the only profession which had not got an organisation to look after the purely economic asnects of its activities is not borne out by the facts. Indeed the Solicitors profession is really not comparable to other professions on the economic front because no other professions is subject to having its fees checked bv a Government appointed official—the Taxing Master—and schedules of cost laid down by persons outside the profession. Also the profession is unique in that the members have to provide bv Statute out of their own resources a Compensation Fund out of which claims against defaulting Solicitors have to be met. Although the number of such defaulters is very small indeed in relation to the total number of practising Solicitors nevertheless it is a burden on individual solicitors to have to contribute annually to this fund. It is however very satisfactory to know that everyone who has proved a claim against the Compensation Fund has been paid in full. But this is not the whole story. A Committee was set up in Britain to consider the question of complaints, their subject matter and the adequacy of the present machinery for dealing with them. It was found that a very high proportion of complaints originate in or involve a failure to communicate. One of the reasons for this is clearly as the report of the committee states is "the profession does not always sufficienly realise that its services are no longer rendered mainly to those who are accustomed to consulting lawyers on business ana family matters" or those who through ignorance will accept the handling of their affairs without question. A new kind of client consults a Solicitor—a client who