provision of the necessary financial resources if it
is to be implemented. It is recommended that the
age of criminal responsibility should be raised to
twelve years. The Society submitted a memoran
dum to the Commission and welcome the publi
cation of the report which
is commended
to
members who are interested in this urgent social
problem.
Decimalisation:
In Autumn, 1969 two bulletins were published
and circulated
to members with
the Society's
Gazette drawing the attention of the profession
to the necessity of preparing for decimalisation.
D-day will
be Monday, 15th February 1971.
Fortunately
the problems affecting
solicitors'
offices are far less complex than those of traders
and manufacturers but the profession must take
all necessary steps to effect a smooth change-over
both for their clients and for their own internal
office system. It is advisable to make preparations
to have the office and clients books of account
written up and balanced before D-day if possible
so that all balances on the accounts can be con
verted to decimals.
The two bulletins already
published by the Society are being up-dated with
the assistance of the Decimal Currency Board
and will be re-issued in the near future with the
Society's Gazette. Members who attended the
recent Seminar at Sligo of the Society of Young
Solicitors had
the opportunity of hearing a
valuable talk on the subject by Mr. Morrison an
official of the Board.
General:
I make no apology for referring again to the
delays in various Government offices which make
much of our work so frustrating.
Complaints
continue to be received about the delays in the
Estate Duty Office and the Land Registry and
even the most efficient solicitor may suffer from
the bad impression given to the public owing to
delays in Government departments due to under-
staffing and other causes. Of course there are
members of the profession who put things on the
long finger. I wonder how many of us could put
our hands on our hearts and say that none of the
delays in our offices are our own fault or the
fault of counsel. I think it behoves us to put our
own houses in order before, or as well as, critic
ising others. Clearly, we must all consider con
stantly how we
can
improve our efficiency,
whether by amalgamation or in other ways, by
more mechanization and so on. I believe that it
is essential to have partners or to have some
method of sharing the load. Greater efficiency is
not the only reason for amalgamation or at least
for taking a partner. It is a fact that 99% of the
claims against the Compensation Fund are against
one-man businesses. The 1970 solicitor has to be
a man of parts, so many parts that it is becoming
daily more impossible for the solicitor practising
on his own to do all that is expected of him. He
may have to be an advocate in the District Court
in the morning and do work far removed from
the drama of the Court in the afternoon. His
work may range from acting for the buyer of a
house to making a will or forming a company or
he may be giving advice on tax problems, en
forcing a contract or drawing up a brief for a
barrister to present a case in Court.
He is also likely to be consulted and asked
to advise on matters which are not strictly legal
matters at all but in which his experience and
knowledge are invaluable.
The only way the
profession can give
the sort of service which
clients expect nowadays is by providing specialists
in
tax, crime, commercial work, trusts, town
planning, litigation and other subjects.
We are inviting a number of solicitors offices
to participate in a time costing exercise. We
recognise of course that in the average solicitors
practice at the moment some jobs must subsidize
others and it would be valuable and instructive
to find out to what extent particular work is re
munerative and what work would have to be
refused or left undone if purely commercial or
economic considerations were taken into account.
Recently I was privileged to attend the National
Conference of the Law Society at Bristol. In his
Inaugural Address the President, Mr. Godfrey
Morley said among other things and
I quote
"more and more in recent years we have been
forced into the position in which the financial
security of solicitors has become a matter of
nagging anxiety. There is little conception of the
burden ,of overheads we carry or the need we
have to maintain a proper balance in the practices
we run. The arduous and anxious work of liti
gation has been rendered less and less economic
to the solicitor and when the signs of this become
apparent we find ourselves subjected to criticism
because we seem to be choosing only the more
remunerative work while neglecting work which
has always been the fundamental element in the
lawyers work namely
the maintenance of
the
lawful rights of citizens". Our problems here are
very similar. Our burden of overheads has been
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