18 / 196
£1,500 to £9,400 price range are proposed so that
registered fees would become 75 per cent rather than
the present two-thirds of unregistered fees. Above £9,000
fees would be cut.
At £20,000 the Board has proposed that scale charges
should be abolished and that solicitors should charge
only a fair rate for the work done.
On mortgages the Board recommends that the present
complex mixture of statutory and non-statutory scales
should be replaced by a new statutory scale with charges
set at 40 per cent of those for conveyancing of registered
land.
On a £5,000 house it would reduce the charge for a
mortgage completed at the same time as a purchase to
£19.50 compared with £29 at present if unregistered,
or £21.87£ if registered.
The Board found that the costs to solicitors of arrang-
ing a purchaser's mortgage was on average only 32 per
cent of the amount charged and so even more profitable
than other conveyancing work.
While the practice continued of one solicitor being
able to act for both buyer and seller, his charges for the
transaction should be reduced to one and a half times
the scale charge, to be apportioned equally between the
vendor and purchaser.
Further, consideration, says the Board, should be
given to achieving a "more simple, cheap and reliable"
system of registered conveyancing. Land registry fees
should be related more closely to the work involved.
The Board points out that while conveyancing was
highly profitable, there was no evidence that levels of
remuneration in the profession as a whole were too
high. Profits from conveyancing were used to subsidise
other less remunerative forms of work.
"The nature of a solicitor's work is such that it is
neither desirable nor practicable to attempt to eliminate
cross-subsidisation completely, though we have before
pointed out—and the profession itself recognises—that
there are serious disadvantages in the present inbalance."
A reduction now of £6 million in conveyancing fees
had to be coupled with the £5 million increase that the
profession received last February when scale fees for
conveyancing cheaper properties were raised.
A net reduction of £1 million had to be seen in the
light of the increases to county court and legal aid fees
made after the board's second report in November 1969.
[Prices and Incomes Board, Report No. 164, Remun-
eration of Solicitors, Stationery Office, 50p.]
The Daily Telegraph
(2nd April 1971))
DISPUTE GOES BACK TO LABOUR COURT
After a suggestion made by Mr. Justice Butler during
the hearing of a motion for an interlocutory injunction
in the High Court yesterday, representatives of the
Irish Transport and General Workers Union and
Unidare Ltd., Finglas, agreed to go back to the Labour
Court to have their dispute further investigated.
On Tuesday last, the company had been granted an
interim injunction restraining seven employees and an
official of the union from picketing its premises and the
premises of an associated company, Anodising Ltd., of
McKee Avenue, Finglas.
Mr. Declan Costello, S.C., was making submissions
on behalf of the company when Mr. Justice Butler
intervened to say : "I don't know what the rights and
wrongs of this dispute are. Already the Labour Court
has taken six days in dealing with this matter which is
obviously one of immense complexity."
Mr. Justice Butler went on to say that it was apparent
that there was a dispute—whether a trade dispute or
not—in existence, but it was now apparent that this
industrial action would not have taken place had three
men, in particular, been reinstated in their employment.
In the interests of future good relations he wondered
if the company could not agree to take these three men
back pending the Labour Court investigations and sug-
gested that if the company, as a result of these investi-
gations, were held to be right all along, that the union
would agree to reimburse the company the salaries of
these men in the meantime, if the Labour Court held
that they had been properly dismissed.
Such a suggestion, Mr. Justice Butler said, would
have the effect of "holding" the dispute until it was
properly investigated; the men would all be back at
work : the company would be back in production and
everybody would be happy.
"I am only putting this out as an agreement in which
each side gives something, and let the matter proceed
to the Labour Court."
At the Judge's suggestion, both sides withdrew to
consider the matter and when the court resumed, Mr.
Liam Hamilton, S.C., for the defendants, said that
agreement had been reached between the parties to go
back to the Labour Court.
Mr. Justice Butler asked was this on the basis that
the strike was over and that everybody went back to
work?
Mr. Costello said that was so.
Mr. Justice Butler: This is clearly on the basis that
all industrial action is off and that the factory goes
back to work until the determination by the Labour
Court. In the event of the Labour Court recommending
that the form of redundancy introduced by the com-
pany had been justified the union would repay to the
company the amount of wages paid in the meantime to
the three particular employees.
The Irish Times
(3rd April 1971)
Note
: Unfortunately this dispute was not settled,
and the Trade Union Congress have now authorised a
general strike in the factory.
MINISTERS AND SECRETARIES
(AMENDMENT) BILL, 1971
A new body, to be set up under a Bill published yester-
day, is to advise Finance Minister Colley oh the organ-
isation and personnel of the public service—all civil
servants, Army, Gardai, teachers and, possibly, state
and semi-state companies.
As well as providing for the new body, the Public
Service Advisory Council, the Bill also envisages the
creation of a Department of the Public Service. This
Department will automatically come under the control
of the current Finance Minister.
Generally, the provisions of the Bill are as expected,
since the acceptance by the Government of sections of
the Devlin Report relating to restructuring of the public
service.
The Council will advise the Minister on the organ-
isation of the public service and on matters relating to
or affecting personnel in the service. It may also be
asked by the Minister to produce a report on a specific
problem relating to,the service.
The Bill also, according to some interpretations,
gives the Council power to bring within its scope a
variety of state and semi-state bodies, since the defini-
tion of "public service" in the Bill includes bodies
17