The Gazette 1972

BOOK REVIEWS

Personal Property

by H. W. Wilkinson, LL.M.; 281 pp.;

Sweet & Maxwell; £1.75.

This is a new book on personal property. The author is

a solicitor and senior lecturer in law in the University of

Bristol. The subject of personal property has tradi-

tionally embraced such divers and unrelated subjects as

sale of goods and donations mortis causa. Of recent

years, however, personal property as a subject for uni-

versity and professional exams has been cut down in

extent and absorbed into the subject of commercial law.

In this field there is a plethora of text books to choose

from for both the student and the practitioner. Yet

Mr. Wilkinson has, in some respects, managed to make

a distinctive and useful contribution in this field. He

has deliberately confined the scope of his book to a

small group of subjects. He devotes two-thirds of the

hook to sale of goods, hire purchase and negotiable

instruments. He makes a detailed analysis of these sub-

jects which will certainly be helpful to a law student.

The chapter on hire purchase has to be read with

caution by Irish readers because of the growing differ-

ence in detail between statute law in this country and

m England. The subject of sale of goods is given an

extensive and detailed treatment and the author uses

many recent English decisions to illustrate the law.

These are helpful because they relate the subject to

contemporary commercial life rather than to horse

dealing in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Many readers will find the detailed treatment of the

law relating to cheques and the relationship of banker

and customer to be of considerable practical impor-

tance not alone for the law student but also for the

practitioner who wishes to get a quick grasp of this

complicated subject. Finally, the book contains a sum-

mary of recommendations of the recent British Crother

Commission on consumer credit which reported last

Year with suggestions for major changes in the law

relating to sales, loans, lending, and security. The British

Government has given no indication as yet that it

Proposes to implement the recommendations in whole

°r in part. Nevertheless, it is expected that leglislation

along the

e lines would probobly be introduced in

along these lines would probably be introduced in

in the best traditional modern textbook style—it is

readable.

Brian O'Connor

Moeran (Edward): Practical Conveyancing;

fifth edi-

hon; London, Oyez Publications; 1971; 8vo; £2.25).

A reading of Edward Moeran's

Practical Conveyancing

makes one realise how much most conveyancers could

improve their efficiency in daily practice. Although this

is a work written for the English practitioner it is quite

surprising how little adjustment is needed to apply the

wisdom and experience it contains to our own rather

different circumstances.

The opening sentences set admirably the tone of the

book : "Thé way I go about a conveyancing job is this.

Except when they are received by letter, instructions

are invariably taken from a client in writing on a

special form (Appendix III, Form 1, facing page 226)

which is duplicated in my office. This form is on

coloured paper, so that it can more readily be picked

out from the other papers, because in the course of the

matter you will refer more often to this than to any

other. The form could as well be printed, except that

by using your duplicate you cán run off small numbers

at a time, and so carry improvements and amendments

into it as they are suggested to you in the course of your

practice; one of the features of this system is that all

the special forms used are adaptable to the particular

and changing needs o fa particular practice."

Mr. Moeran's system is based on the use of forms:

the Instructions Sheet and three Agendas, one pre-

completion, one for completion and one after comple-

tion. The Instructions Sheet sets out all the questions

you should ask a client when acting for him on a pur-

chase or sale, but one or more of which you may omit

if you rely purely on memory. The three Agendas

remind you of the steps that occur in a conveyancing

transaction and should be amended or expanded by

each practitioner on the basis of his own experience

until they become, for all practical purposes, compre-

hensive. When this point is reached, the forms provide

an insurance against oversight and a permanent record

of the steps in each transaction which will enable the

transaction to be taken over in the absence of the per-

son first dealing with it without undue difficulty.

As the author says "like driving a car, good convey-

ancing is largely a matter of making habitual to- the

point of reflex action the routine aná technique, leaving

all one's faculties free to deal with the finer points and

the real problems."

The author suggests that every solicitor should have

standard form draft Conveyances. Assignments and

Land Registry Transfers and also suggests certain stan-

dard form letters—such as undertakings to banks to

lorjn-

et proceeds of sale—which will ensure that

members of his staff can do things in his name with the

m'n'mum of suoervis'on.

TWs hook is heartily recommended.

Maurice Current