The Gazette 1983

GAZETTE

N O V E M B E R

1983

At the Presentation of Parchments ceremony on the 17th of November 1983, Mr. Thomas V. (Val) O'Connor, Past President of the Law Society, presented his youngest son, Tony, with his parchment. Mr. O'Connor's three other sons, Tom, Pat and John are also solicitors. Also in the picture is Professor Laurence Sweeney, the Society's Director of Training.

I NCOR PORAT ED LAW SOCIETY OF I RELAND

IMPORTANT NOTICE

SOLICITORS' ACCOUNTS REGULATIONS 1967 (AS AMENDED) ACCESS TO CLIENTS FILES

The Compensa t i on Fund Committee of the Society has recently made a ruling on the question of the auditors' access to clients files. It will not be satisfactory, in future, to deprive an auditor from the examination of clients files purely on the grounds of privilege. The auditor has specific duties under the Solicitors' Accounts Regulations and it is the Society's view that these duties can only be carried out by vouching the transactions in the books of account with the suppor t i ng files. It should not be necessary, however, to disclose the entire file to the audi tor but the correspondence covering payments/receipts should be made available to the audi tor. A policy decision has been made by the Society to investigate any solicitor's practice who refuses that auditor access to clients files. Where the Society appoints an accoun t ant pur suant to Section 20 of the Solicitors' Accounts Regulations 1967 as amended, the said accountant has the statutory right to inspect all of the relevant files, vouchers, etc.

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