The Gazette 1972

Farming is to come under this rule eventually and many people fear that if the Land Commission is not changed within the next year to consolidate the pool of land that will become available as old farmers without heirs pass on, for the national restructuring programme, foreigners may be able to take advantage of the situation. At the moment most of the EEC countries have bet- ter defences against undesirable land purchases than the Land Commission has. In Germany, for example, the local agricultural coun- cil must approve all purchases whether by foreigners or not to make sure that all land will be put to the best use and since it is being predicted that each member State of the EEC will be responsible for implementing its own rural structural reform programme, Ireland, if she joins, will have little difficulty in preventing the purchase of farmland to speculators if the same proce- dure is followed. The ten-year residential period being proposed by the County Committees is far in excess of present EEC legislation, which enables foreign farmers to buy land if the land has been totally unused for two years or if the purchaser has worked as a farm hand or tenant for two In re. a Solicitor Is a solicitor employed as "agent" to do conveyancing, the employer advertising "cut rates", holding him- self out, and seeking instructions? QBD, Ashworth, James and Bristow J J ; 13th March 1972; Appeal from Dssciplinary Committee of the Law Society. A solicitor, practised on his own account until 30th September 1970. In October 1970 he informed the secretary of the Professional Purposes Committee of the Law Society that he was now an agent for the National House Owners' Society. An inquiry agent for the Law Society interviewed him when he said that he acted as solicitor for the internal affairs of the NHOS and as agent for NHOS when its members were referred to him with their conveyancing work. He was called before the Disciplinary Committee of the Law Society to answer charges of professional misconduct a n d / or unbe- fitting conduct in that he had (a) in breach of Rule 1 of the Solicitors' Practice Rules 1936 sought instructions for professional business; and (b) in breach of Rule 2 held himself out as prepared to do professional business in non-contentious matters at less than the fixed scale fees. The Law Society submitted that the advertisements by which NHOS advertised their conveyancing services to members at rates less than those charged by solicitors, were an indirect instruction seeking by the solicitor for professional business, that by doing conveyancing for NHOS members at "cut rates" he held himself out, although not by name, as being ready to do profes- sional business at "cut rates". Pre-contract enquiries which he conducted for NHOS members were signed

years in the country where he intends to farm. At the moment, nobody, not even the Land Commis- sion, knows how much of our 16 million acres of land is in the hands of non-nationals, although the Commis- sion is satisfied that ' the figure is nothing like one million acres. The reasons why no precise statistics are available date back to the early days of the State when foreigners were invited over to establish industries here and no records were kept of the transactions. Since the passing of the 1965 Land Act, however, when control over the purchase of land by non-qualified persons was vested in the Land Commission, more than 19,000 acres have been sold to non-nationals. The amounts of land have ranged between 6 and 1,587 acres and the nationalities involved are British, Ameri- can, German, Canadian, Australian, Swedish, Dutch, South African, French, Finnish, Swiss, Austrian and Belgian. Representations have also been made to the Minister for Lands by the Irish Law Society to have all lands acquired by the Commission in future paid for in cash instead of Land Bonds as at present. by him as "proposed purchaser's solicitor", a draft agreement provided that the sale be completed "at the office of the vendors' solicitor" naming himself as that solicitor. The committee decided that the allegations were substantiated and fined him £750. He appealed, contending that his position was no different from that of a salaried solicitor employed by an insurance company- Ashworth J said it was argued for the solicitor that there had been no holding out by him, for he was simply a paid agent, that in so far as there had been 3 holding out by advertisements and brochures, it was done by the NHOS. The judgment of Lord Goddard CJ in re A Solicitor [1951] 2 All ER 108, 111, applied in the present case. The solicitor enlisted in the NHO^ aware of its objects and allowed his services to be used for "cut rates". Throughout he held a practising certi* ficate, and he carried out the conveyancing work. H e ws holding himself out to the NHOS and through the NHOS to its members, and had no answer to the charg e of a breach of Rule 2. As for Rule 1, counsel for the Law Society said that on the facts, albeit not directly, the solicitor was seeking instructions because those h e called his principals were seeking professional business which he carried out and therefore he was seeking professional work. His Lordship would dismiss th e appeal. . James J, agreeing that the appeal should fail, said that there was no warrant for reading into either rul e the qualification "being a practising solicitor". Bristow J agreed. Appeal dismissed with costs.

Solicitors Journal (24th March 1972)

124