7 / 736
wreck and was probably defective when the client
bought
it. Member enquired whether he was
bound by his undertaking and whether the client
was entitled to repudiate the authority which he
gave to member to pay the sum of £150, being
a minor at the time of the authority. The Council
on a report from a committee stated that on the
facts member was bound by his undertaking. They
express no view on the second question which was
a matter of law.
THE ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING
The Ordinary General Meeting of the Society
was held at the Imperial Hotel Cork on Saturday,
20th May 1967.
The President, Mr. Patrick O'Donnell,
took
the chair. The notice convening the meeting and
the minutes of the last Ordinary General Meeting
which has been circulated was by permission
taken as read.
Mr. Sean McCarthy, the Lord Mayor of Cork,
and Mr. John Jermyn, the President of the South–
ern Law Association, addressed the meeting and
welcomed
the Society
to Cork. The President
thanked the Lord Mayor and Mr. Jermyn.
The President as chairman of
the meeting
nominated the following members of the Society
as the scrutineers of the ballot for the election of
the Council to be held on 16th November 1967 :
John R. McC. Blakeney, Thomas Jackson (senior),
Brendan P. McCormack, Roderick J. Tierney and
Alexander J. McDonald.
The President addressing the meeting said :
Ladies
and Gentlemen,
since
our
last Ordinary
General Meeting the following members of the Society
died and I would like to express our sincere condolence
with their families and business associates :
Martin Kelly, County Registrar, Kilkenny; Michael
Noyk, Solicitor, Dublin; Patrick J. Flynn, County Regis–
trar, Roscommon; Francis A. Gibney, Solicitor, Dublin;
J. Allan Osborne, Solicitor, Milford; Bernard McDer-
mott, Solicitor, Ballybofey; William T. Nicholl, Solicitor,
Dublin; Kevin Nugent, Solicitor, Clonmel; Dermot
McDowell, Solicitor, Dublin; Mrs. Beatrice Elyan, Solici–
tor, Cork; Michael J. Dunne, Solicitor, Dublin; Aubrey
R. Walker, Solicitor, Dublin; Dr. Joseph Jackson Wolfe,
Herts., England.
Since Mr. Taylor addressed
the Ordinary General
Meeting of the Society in November last an increasing
burden of work has fallen upon the Council and the
officials of the Society. It has been necessary to increase
the Society's staff to deal with this work. Problems of
office accommodation have also arisen and both
the
activities and physical accommodation of the Society in
the Solicitors Buildings are stretched to their full capa–
city. The members of the profession are given extremely
good value for
the nominal subscription of £1 per
annum. In passing it may be noted that the subscription
was fixed at this figure in 1852 and has not since been
increased. The time has come when the financial position
of the Society and the distribution of its resources and
activities should be
examined having
regard
to
the
requirements of the future and the increasing part which
the Society must play
in
enabling practitioners
to
carry on practice to the greatest advantage for their
clients and themselves. In this statement I shall give a
brief account of the more important activities of the
Society during the past six months under the following
headings:
(a) Services to the Public.
(b) Services
to
the Profession
(including
solicitors
apprentices who may expect to be admitted within
the next four or five years).
(c) General Matters.
The Society is
in the somewhat unique position of
having public responsibility to ensure that the standards
of conduct, professional efficiency and integrity are main–
tained at the highest level. It is in the interests of the
profession as well as
the public that these standards
should be maintained. We enjoy privileges in certain
fields of professional business. In return we must see that
we discharge our duties adequately. Without a central
professional organisation appointed by
the profession
itself standards of conduct and integrity would inevitably
fall. It is this sense of public responsibility which distin–
guishes a profession from purely commercial and indus–
trial organisations. It is equally important that industry
and commerce should maintain high standards of integ–
rity and efficiency but the regulation of these standards
is left to the individual trader. In the profession there is
corporate responsibility through the governing body of
the profession to see that every member is conscious of
the standards expected of him and
to enforce
these
standards by appropriate action taken by the profession
itself. This duty which rests upon the profession is the
counterpart of the statutory privileges which it enjoys.
A decline
in professional standards would affect
the
whole community and as regards the legal profession
would have
serious effects on
the standards of
the
judiciary and
the public
legal
administration upon
which public order and the rights of every citizen so
greatly depends. The judiciary
is
recruited from
the
legal profession and the high standards of integrity and
independence shown by the Bench in this country since
the foundation of the State reflects
the standards of
conduct
imposed on private practitioners from which
the Bench is drawn.
Solicitors Accounts Regulations 1967
In November last the Council made special regulations
entitled
the Solicitors Accounts
(Amendment No.
2)
Regulations 1966 providing for the lodgment by each
practising solicitor with the Society of a Certificate by
an Accountant each year. The accountant must certify
that the solicitor is complying with the provisions of the
Solicitors Accounts Regulations in regard to the keeping
of proper office books of account written up to date and
lodging all clients monies and
trust monies
to
the
appropriate designated bank account kept specially for
that purpose. The regulations were made under Section
66 of the Solicitors Act, 1954, following a postal ballot
taken by the Council which revealed that about 90 per
cent of the practitioners who returned voting papers
were in favour of the proposal. The machinery pre-