The Gazette 1990

GAZETTE

' APRIL 1990

but to assist the parties to achieve service and if necessary to prove that that service had taken place in the specified circumstances. (C) Did that form of service comply with Order 65, rule 5? Woolf L J considered that rather than the Courts seeking by adopting an extended interpreta- tion of the rule to apply the existing rule to service by fax, it was better to leave to the Rules Committee the task of re-drafting or otherwise amending the rule as they had done in the case of the Document Exchange. (D) Was the quality of the document produced by fax acceptable? Counsel argued that a document produced by a fax machine was not appropriately regarded as a docu- ment because the majority of the documents now produced by the use of fax were not as durable as documents printed on ordinary paper. Counsel also relied on Order 66, rules 1 and 2 of the U.K. Rules of the Supreme Court which dealt with the quality and size of paper and the printing of documents "prepared by parties for use in the Supreme Court". His Lordship strongly suspected that those rules were not intended to deal with the quality of documents served on other parties but the quality of documents prepared for use in court. Bearing in mind that in the ordinary course of events copies of the document were going to be made by the recipient if it was a document which was going to have to be referred to in the proceedings, his Lordship did not consider that there was any substance in that point.

Glidewell L J delivered a concurr- ing judgment and Lloyd L J delivered a judgment concurring in the result.

tion. He had obtained sanction for an additional 35 staff for the Land Registry in 1990. Eleven of these had already been recruited and had taken up duty. Every effort was being made to have the remaining staff recruited as quickly as pos- sible. As a short term measure, the Minister stated that some senior staff had been diverted from other work to deal with the kind of cases where the worst delays were occurring. The Minister stated that he had also made arrangements for the filling of the post of Registrar of Deeds and Titles and he had ob- tained agreement from the Minister for Finance for an appointment of a number of staff at senior level. In addition, the Minister stated that he had provided for an increase in computerisation expenditure of the order of 32 per cent over 1989. A programme of computerisation of the abstracts in the Registry of Deeds would start early this year and the computerisation pro- gramme in the Land Registry, which was already well under way, would be extended further. The Minister concluded by stating that the measures he had outlined were initial steps which he had taken in tackling the problem of delays in the Land Registry and Registry of Deeds. He was con- tinuing to review the operation of the registries and would take whatever steps were necessary to resolve the problems there.

DELAYS IN LAND REG I S TRY AND REG I S TRY OF DE EDS Mr. Flanagan TD asked the Minister for Justice in the Dail on February 27, 1990 that, having regard to the content of the recently published annual report of the Land Registry and Registry of Deeds, if he would accept that delays in both registries were chronic and unacceptable; and if the Minister would outline positive proposals to address the matter. The Minister for Justice, Mr. Burke, replied stating as a pre- liminary matter that he must point out that in accordance with normal procedures the annual report in question had not been published. The Minister stated he had indi- cated to the House in the course of the debate on the Provate Members' motion on 14 November last, that he was concerned at the level of delays in the service being provided by the Land Registry and Registry of Deeds. These delays were due mainly to an increase in the intake of work and a shortage of staff. Indeed the Minister stated that there had been an increase of 18.7 per cent in 1989 over 1988 in dealing with applications which comprise the bulk of Land Registry work. The Minister stated that shortly after taking up office he initiated a general review of the operation of the registries and while he had not completed that review he had taken some steps to alleviate the situa-

COURT HEAR I NGS Mr. Taylor T.D. asked the Minister for Justice in the Dail on February

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