The Gazette 1976

GAZETTE

March 1976

EUROPEAN SECTION Dublin Meeting of the Commission Consultative (November 1975) by John G. Moloney

House, the splendid reception rooms of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which was attended by the members of the Commission Consultative and by Ministers and Judges. On the following night there was a reception and dinner given jointly by the Bar and the Society in the magnificent dining hall of the King's Inn. During the day the ladies attended a fashion show and went on a bus tour through south County Dublin and County Wicklow. On the Saturday and Sunday a number of delegates and their wives accompanied by Mr. Geoffrey Coyle went by bus through Limerick, where they stopped for tea, to dinner and to spend the night at the Aghadoe Heights Hotel in Killarney fol- lowed by a tour the following day of the Ring of Kerry- finishing up at Acton's Hotel in Kinsale where they were joined by the President and Vice-President and two other members of the Council of the Southern Law Association. They then left by air from Cork the following morning. Ireland was represented at the meeting in Dublin by- Messrs Moloney, Jermyn, Fish, Blaney and Cooke while twenty-three delegates turned up from the eight other member countries and in addition there was an obser- ver each from Switzerland, Norway and Sweden and Mr. Stanley Crossick represented the UIA. Mr. Colum Gavan Duffy was specially allowed as Editor of the Gazette, to attend the meetings. The conference was held in the Shelbourne Hotel for two and a half days. The full agenda included a meeting of the Working Committee, a welcome to Ireland by the President, Mr. Osborne, an address by the President of the Com- mission Consultative on the occasion of the fifteenth anniversary, discussions on the subscription and budget for the coming year, the problem of youth, legal defence insurance, the election of President, a resume by Me. Ehlers of Denmark in relation to Notaries, EEC Criminal Law and the following two subjects which were dealt with in more depth and at greater length. 1. Deontology The first of these was a Report on Deontology by Mr. David Edward a Scottish QC. One of the matters which receives considerable attention from the Com- mission Consultative is what is known generally on the Continent as Deontology which comes from a Greek word meaning obligation. It seems to cover what is known in Ireland both as ethics and etiquette and gives rise to considerable problems from time to time. It is likely in the future, as contact between lawyers within the EEC increases, to give further difficulty unless it can be dealt with and regulated properly. Mr. Edward's Report has been the first examination in depth in the Commission Consultative and he found that to a very large extent the basic principles are similar in all coun- tries, although there are considerable differences, some of them of considerable importance, in some aspects. He had thought as a first step that the Resolutions which he proposed in his Report ought to be passed and that other aspects of the problem should be left for further study. This was, in fact, agreed to at Dublin and the Resolutions, which were passed, will he pub- lished subsequently. 2. Draft Directive on Freedom to Provide Services One of the reasons for the coming into being of Commission Consultative was Article 55 of the Treaty of Rome. Since then, of course, there have been the developments of the draft Directive and the two deci- sions of the European Court at Luxembourg concerning Reyners and van Binsbergen. The draft Directive and 27

What is known familiarly as the Commission Consul- tative and more formally as the Commission Consul- tative des Barreaux des Pays de la Communauté Euro- péenne is an offshoot of the Union Internationale des Avocats (UIA) which met for the first time on 3rd December 1960, and is composed of representatives of the National Bars and Ordres of the countries of the Common Market. It is composed of a President and Secretary-General and three represen- tatives from each country with three substitutes or 'suppléants" from each of the nine member countries and observers from Sweden, Norway and Switzerland. The present President is Maitre Albert Brunois of Paris and the Secretary-General is Maitre Jean-Regnier Thys of Brussels. Up to recently the expenses of the Commission were met by equal subscriptions of the Member States and half that amount by Observer States but in November 1975 it was decided in Dublin that each Member State would pay a flat 20,000 Belgian Francs and the Obser- ver States 10,000 Belgian francs each with the balance of the expenses divided into 105 parts of which Ger- many, France, Italy and the U.K. pay 18 each, Belgium and the Netherlands 10 each, Denmark and Ireland 6 each, Luxembourg 2 and the Observer States 3 each. Meetings are held two or three times a year in different countries and in addition there are a number of meetings of a more or less permanent working com- mittee and meetings of various ad hoc committees. Each country names a person within that country who will be responsible for the dissemination of infor- mation to the various delegates and the sending of information from that country to the Secretary-General. The person in question is known as a Délégué aux Relations and in the case of Ireland is Mr. James J. I vers, the Director-General of the Society. By arrangement with the General Council of the Bar of Ireland the expenses of Ireland to the Commission Consultative are shared and usually Ireland is repre- sented at a meeting by one member nominated by the Society and one by the Bar. Since 1973 the Law Society nomination has been bestowed upon Mr. G. J. Moloney, while the Bar, originally represented by Mr. (now Mr. Justice) Thomas A. Doyle has sent Mr. John D. Cooke to recent meetings. The first meeting at which the Society was repre- sented was at Bruges in October 1973 and since then, there have been meetings at Paris in March 1974, Rotterdam October 1974, Berlin April 1975, Dublin November 1975 and the next two meetings are due to take place in Stratford-upon-Avon in May 1976 and at Perugia in October 1976. The meeting of the Commission in Dublin was organ- ised jointly by the Society and the Bar Council who established a special committee for the purpose and also a Ladies' Committee to run a special programme for the wives of delegates attending. To judge by the expressions of appreciation and thanks after the meet- ing, the social programme was completely successful. It included a reception of delegates and wives by the President at Aras an Uachtarán followed by a buffet reception given by the Attorney-General in Iveagh