The Gazette 1974

would re-transfer the matters to the Attorney Gener 3, 8. Section 6 makes it unlawful for any person, oth 2r than a person who has a legitimate interest, to at tempt to influence the making by the Attorney Gej 1 ' eral, the Director, their officers, State Solicitors or th® Gardai, of a decision not to initiate or to withdraw criminal proceedings. 9. Section 7 provides for the distribution by the A torney General and the Director of State briefs t0 barristers in a fair and equitable manner. Consultation between the Attorney General, the Director and tn General Council of the Bar as to the best manner which this objective can be achieved is provided f° r ' There is also provision for a complaints procedure & the event of individual barristers feeling aggrieved in relation to the distribution of State briefs. 10. Section 8 provides for proof in Court of docu- ments issued by the Attorney General or the Director- 11. Section 9 provides for the possibility of a sudden vacancy in the office of Director and for a period 0 incapacity of the Director. There is provision for p uD lication of appointments and terminations of appo| nt ments in Irish Oifigiuil and for minimum qualification^ of a temporary Director and an acting Director. J minimum qualifications for their appointment 3 lower than those for an appointment under Section > in order, amongst other considerations, to underline t fact that the temporary Director would have no cla 1 to succeed as permanent Director. 12. Section 10 enables the Taoiseach to make r e g u ations to enable the Act to have full effect. Section provides for a consequential repeal. Section 12 provide for the laying of regulations before the Oireacht 3S j section / 3 for administration expenses and section for citation and commencement. be acceptable. A three-year post-graduate law trains- will be necessary, commencing with a year's intensi training with the Law Society, followed by nearly 1 ^ years of practical training in your master's office 3fl ending then with a final examination. . ( These changes which necessarily have had to tailored to fit into the Society's powers under the ex| ing Solicitors' Acts—which are technical and restricts in many aspects—are designed to give a much bett ^ emphasis to training and experience in a practical m a S ner in offices. We on the Council of the Society, that they are a vast improvement on the present s Y st ^ t . the defects of which are the overlapping of univers'. and the Society's courses and lack of time for pract' ca training. You may be unique in another sense in that P oS a j j you are the last to get parchments written on act u parchment. It seems to be disappearing. The law | be an ass but it is no longer being served by goats! , I would like to make a plea to solicitors to rev' e ^ their affairs to see how they may take apprentices 3,1 so accommodate what is a great problem of find' 11 - 1 190

tice, and the Attorney General shall investigate the condition of health or conduct of the Director. The Government having considered the report of this Com- mittee, may remove the Director from office. 5 .Section 3 ( / ) confers upon the Director all the powers, duties and functions capable of being exercised by the Attorney General in relation to Criminal Matters and Election and Referendum Petitions. The section also provides for certain transitional arrangements and preserves the position of the Attorney General in re- lation to the Constitutional validity of any laws, and to decide whether a point of law is of public importance on appeal from the Court of Criminal Appeal. 6. Certain functions have been conferred on the Attorney General by statute which are more or less routine and which are performed many times each day, e.g. the giving of consent to summary disposal in appropriate cases. It has been suggested, in the con- tc*:t of section 47 of the Offences against the State Ací, 1C3C, that a function so conferred must be per- formed personally by the Attorney General. This sit- uation has been dealt with up to the present by ob- taining the personal directions of the Attorney Gen- eral in these cases. Under section 4, the function will, in law, continue to be performed by the Attorney Gen- eral or the Director, as the case may be, but may be performed, on his behalf, in accordance with partic- ular or general instructions issued by him. 7. Section 5 provides for the possibility that at any time the Government might consider it necessary for reasons of national security, to exclude certain crimin- al matters e.g. schedule offences within the meaning of the Offences against the State Act, from the scope of the functions of the Director. Under this section, this could be achieved by Government order, which

Presentation of Parchments to Newly Qualified Solicitors The following address was delivered by Mr. Peter D. M. Prentice, President, on Thursday, 6 June 1974, on the occasion of presenting parchments to new solicitors. Ladies and Gentlemen : This is one of our most pleasurable occasions—a family occasion—where we can relax in the knowledge that the end of the appren- ticeship road has been reached, all examinations over and nothing remains but to receive the parchment which proclaims success to all effort.

We are gathered here to congratulate our latest body of newly-qualified solicitors and in this little ceremony to wish them well in their future, whether it be in prac- tice, in business in industry or whatever road they may now take as a result of qualifying. You who have now qualified can in a sense treat your- self as among the last products of an educational sys- tem which is about to change radically. As and from Octobery 1975—next year—it will not be possible to enter into apprenticeship unless and until the student has had a university degree conferred. In most cases it will be a law degree although certain other degrees will