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with an undertaking by the solicitor for the per
sonal
representatives
to bring
in a corrective
affidavit. The Assistant Secretary wrote to the
Society on March llth stating that the delays in
the Estate Duty Office are causing a good deal
of anxiety to the Revenue Commissioners and
that a review of the work and the staffing needs
of the branch has been carried out and that the
report is now in the Commissioners' hands. It
was pointed out that a large part of the trouble
is due to the fact that practically the entire Assis
tant Examiners staff is inexperienced due to wastage
in the grade over the past 12 years due to officers
going to other jobs (Land Registry, Junior Ad
ministrative, etc.). The result is that more than
half of the present complement in the particular
grade have
less
than
two years
service. The
Assistant Secretary wrote that the question of pro
visional assessment in all cases had been raised by
the Society in a number of occasions in the past
including a meeting with
the Revenue Com
missioners on 19th June 1964 and that the views
of the Commissioners had been already fully set
out in correspondence.
The fact is that the Revenue Commissioners
are of the opinion that where provisional assess
ments are issued it is in a number of cases ex
ceedingly difficult to obtain answers
to queries
and requisitions subsequently raised and they say
there
is great delay
in getting corrective affi
davits and for this reason they are not prepared
to make a provisional assessment insisting in all
or most cases on the entire assets being returned
and duty assessed before the grant of probate or
administration can be issued.
Accepting that what
the Revenue Commis
sioners say is correct as to delay by members of
the profession in answering correspondence from
the Estate Duty Office it is obvious that these
members who must be in a minority are the
cause of the reluctance on the part of the Revenue
Commissioners to accept what would be a forward
step in enabling the profession as a whole to get
their
business
transacted more
speedily
and
efficiently.
The Society also suggested that the require
ment of the lodgment of a duplicate schedule of
assets might
be
discontinued. The Assistant
Secretary states that this matter is under con
sideration with the Probate officer. As the present
practice by which the duplicate goes to the Pro
bate Office and finally
to
the Public Records
Office is one of long standing going back well
before 1922, the matter is not entirely within the
Commissioners' power.
SOCIETY'S STANDARD CONDITIONS OF
SALE
In a comment on the article published in the
January issue of the Society's
Gazette
a member
raised several questions The first dealt with the
provision in the standard conditions that any out
standing legal estate shall be got in by the pur
chaser at his own expense. Counsel stated that
this is for the protection of the vendor and that
a solicitor omitting it could become liable to the
vendor for negligence. Member enquired whether
there is not another risk arising from this for the
solicitor acting for the purchaser. If he accepts
such a clause without the specific authority of his
client may he not find himself liable to the pur
chaser if it turns out that there is an outstand
ing legal estate which can only be got in at
expense to the purchaser and that in default of
getting it in the purchaser finds himself in some
difficulty. The matter was referred to conveyanc
ing Counsel who settled the standard conditions
and his comment was to the following effect.
The condition as to tracing and getting in the
legal estate has been in use for a great many
years—certainly one hundred. In the case of a
sale by private contract it is open to the pur
chaser's solicitor to ask
to have it stated what
legal estate is outstanding and where it is. Never
theless Counsel did not think
that a solicitor
would be negligent if he allowed his client to
sign a contract with this provision in it. In Cam-
berwell etc. Building Society v. Holloway (13 Ch.
Div. at page 763) Jessel M.R. says :
The general rule is this, that a man makes
a good title by showing a good equitable
title to get in the legal estate. You are not
bound to trace the legal estate further than
to show you can get at it.
In this country the fact of the legal estate being
outstanding is of even less importance by reason
of the system of registration of deeds and the
non-application of the principle of tacking. The
condition would not cover any real defect in the
title. Counsel added that in nine cases out of ten
the vendor will have purchased under a similar
condition probably at a sale by auction when he
could do nothing about it.
Member also drew attention to the clause in
the standard conditions which binds
the pur
chaser to take the property subject to all rights
of way, easements, etc. affecting
the property
and without obligation on the part of the vedor
to specify them. He considered that a solicitor
accepting such a clause could find himself
in
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