The Gazette 1979

JULY-AUGUST

1979

GAZETTE

Are Young Solicitors Getting a Raw Deal from the Profession? Text of an address read by Harry Sexton at the Society's Annual Conference in Galway

could be compared to old smouldering coals which are at anytime going to kindle violently. And the trouble is that you need quite an experienced and hard necked chap to be able to sit down on these coals in order to prevent the said kindling. These Offices have three distinguishing features; first, work is normally badly in arrears; secondly, the work to be cleared up cannot be cleared up quickly since this is the main reason why it has fallen into arrears in the first place; lastly, things keep getting lost as a result of poor or non-existant filing and indexing systems. How often have we all heard of the young Solicitor, now two or three years qualified who has been driven to setting up practice on his own largely out of sense of despair that he would never find a satisfactory place to work. Even though establishing a new practice is fraught with all sorts of difficulties such as attracting business in the early stages and initial cash flow difficiencies regular perusal

I must first question why, from the wording of the motion, it is clearly assumed that young Solicitors are quite set apart from and unconnected with "The Profession". This, of course, is not the case and figures can show that today we have a very young profession — so young in fact that it can be argued that young Solicitors largely constitute "The Profession". Suffice it to say without delving too deeply into the realm of statistics that roughly one third of the profession is less than five years qualified. Another way of putting this is to say that 40% of members are under the cradle age of 30. When making comparisons with other jurisdictions of similar size and population these statistics are not particularly unusual. However, no other jurisdiction is expecting anything approaching the rapid growth in numbers forecast for our own profession. Another thousand newly qualified Solicitors will emerge within the next four years and almost as many again will qualify under the new training programme by 1986. And then we are labelled exclusionists. It is clear that young lobby is becoming increasingly strong, if not yet vocal, and that the demands of the young Profession are of everyday concern to the majority of firms in the Country, large or small. These demands are many and varied whether you are among the members of a panel or partners in a large firm employing many assistant Solicitors or simply the principal in a small office employing perhaps one or two assistants. On reflection this is hardly surprising in that the present younger generation — not merely Solicitors - irrespective of class, background or occupation has far higher expectations of life in general than any previous generation. Career's Guidance experts are often amazed at the expectations of School leavers especially among those who for want of ability or ambition or both will almost inevitably fail to reach those expectation. Similarly, young Solicitors embarking on new careers could be criticized for having unrealistic expectations regarding salary and conditions. On the other hand it would be difficult to alter these expectations given today's affluent Society and, having accepted them as fact, atten- tion must be focussed on whether young Solicitors are given a raw deal. I must make it absolutely clear that the pomments and criticisms I shall offer are in no way intended to be a reflection on any of my colleagues with whom I am professionally associated at the moment but are drawn mainly from my knowledge of the experiences °f friends and acquaintances in the Profession. Young Solicitors not infrequently accept employment where unknown to themselves at the outset, they are re- quired to perform what are vulgarly called "fire brigade" J °bs in their employer's Offices. The place is never actually on fire. Nor are flames leaping to the heavens in a metaphorical sense for then the Law Society's trusty firemen would be foaming and splashing out freezing Orders and all sorts of molten brimstone to quell the raging torrent. No. The kind of place I am speaking of