The Gazette 1995

GAZETTE

MWH AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 1995

claims unless they believed courts would find them guilty of negligence he said. I B EC, according to the article, welcomed the Law So c i e t y 's proposal to curb advertising by solicitors and to put an end to 'ambulance chasing'. An article was published in the Irish Times on the 19 August, 1995 by Carol Coulter. The headline read "Calls For Curbs on Solicitors Ads". "Proponents defend the 'no foal no fee' practice as giving the poor access to civil law" she states. She continues "the question of solicitors advertising has become a contentious one, with the employers' association I B EC and the insurance industry accusing the profession of contributing to a 'compensation culture'". The article went on to say that the Law Society is examining the issue, and will be issuing new guidelines to replace those it issued in 1988, when it first became legal for lawyers to advertise. The article examined the different issues involved and concluded that: "It is likely that, when the Law So c i e t y 's new regulations come into force, the nature of solicitors advertising will change. But it is arguable whether this will change the volume of litigation. The attitudes which have produced a high level of litigation in Ireland extend beyond the legal profession". An article was published in the Sunday Business Post on 20 August, 1995 with the heading " Compo Culture Debate Heats Up". The article stated that Ken Murphy, Director General of the Law Society stirred up a hornet's when he suggested on Morning Ireland that personal injury claims arose from a negligence culture rather than a claims culture. The article quoted Ken Murphy who stood over his Morning Ireland statement and said he would not automatically accept statistics from a vested interest group like I B EC unless he had the opportunity to examine the authority for them. " S o much can be done with statistics" he said. The article stated that there is an oversupply of solicitors and that industry argue that this influx of newly-qualified practitioners will push more solicitors towards personal injury claims, which 224

are quite lucrative and viewed as easy money. Ken Murphy said, "We have been told by the Government that we h a v e to operate an open-access policy in terms of admissions to the profession. Solicitors will have to develop every area of potential business and this (personal injury cases) is one of them." The article concluded with the words of the Director General "but solicitors cannot invent claims. Either people have been injured by the negligence of others and are entitled to claim, or An article was published in the Irish Independent on 21 August, 1995 with the headline "Employers Clash with Solicitors on Injury Claims". The article stated that "a new row about Ireland's high rate of injury claims erupted last night as employers organisation I B EC said the problem had its roots more deeply embedded in the compensation culture than in deficient safety standard in the work place". The article continued: "However, a Law Society spokeswoman hit back last night, saying damages would not be awarded unless there was negligence. If I B EC was concerned about the level of damages, employers should look to their own safety standards" she added. The Director General participated in a debate with Neil McGuinness, an I B EC spokesperson on health and safety, on the R T E 1 radio programme 'Between the Lines' on 22 August, 1995. Neil McGuinness claimed that the record of Irish business on accidents in the work place was better in the UK. Ken Murphy took issue with the statistics figures being used. He pointed out that such authorities as the Minister of State for Labour Affairs, Ms Eithne Fitzgerald and Mr Eugene Carney, Industrial Engineer of S I PTU, have researched and found that only 1 5% of reportable accidents in Ireland are actually reported. He contended that fatal injury statistics are much more reliable and they show that fatal workplace injuries in Ireland in 1993 were three times higher than the UK. As a matter of probability it they have not. The number of solicitors does not affect that essential reality".

follows that serious and minor injury risk is also substantially higher in Ireland than in the UK. The European Commissioner had found that Ireland had the lowest perception of risk in relation to safety in the workplace of any state in the EU. He said that employers will not pay out damages unless there is negligence and that no claim can be sustained unless there is negligence. He stood over his claim that there is a 'negligence culture' in this country and employers should increase safety levels if they want to reduce the number of claims instead of blaming solicitors. The Director General hit out at I B E C ' s 'compo culture' campaign saying " The health and safety record here is nothing to be proud of and quite frankly the Law Society and solicitors are getting a bit fed up with I B EC seeking to blame solicitors. The level of claims is high, the level of negligence is high and I B EC should be addressing cause of the problem, not its symptom". Independent on 23 August, 1995 it was reported that the unions had now clashed with employers on safety. The article stated that "an estimated 3 , 0 00 Irish people died in the work place over 25 years - as many as in the North troubles", the country's largest trade union said yesterday. S I P TU safety officer, Sylvester Cronin, claimed thousands o f accidents in the work place went unreported every year and said the onus was on employers to reduce the cost of claims". "There has been no outcry about the carnage in the work place", said Mr. Cronin, who insisted Ireland had four times as many work-related fatalities per capita as Britain. In an article in the Irish

Catherine Dolan.

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