The Gazette 1983

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INCORPORATED LAW SOCIETY OF IRELAND GAZETTE
Vol. 77 No. 10
In this issue . . .
Comment 267
The Sex of a Parent as a factor in
Custody Disputes 269
Council Election 1983/84 275
Addiction Problems reviewed by Society's
Symposium 278
Barring Orders and Ouster Orders —
Judicial Change of attitude 279
Companies (Amendment) Act, 1983
Part 2 288
Executive Editor: Mary Buckley
Editorial Board: Charles R. M. Meredith. Chairman
John F. Buckley
Gary Bvrnc
William Earlcy
Michael V. O'Mahony
Maxwell Sweeney
Advertising: Eiam O hOisin. Telephone 305236
The views expressed in this publication, save where
other-wise indicated, are the views of the contributors
and not necessarily the views of the Council of the
Society.
The appearance of an advertisement in this publication
d o es not necessarily indicate approval by the Society for
the product or service advertised.
Published at Blackhall Place. Dublin 7.
December 1983
Comment. . .
. . . The Legislation Log-Jam
ONE of the more worrying aspects of our legislative
process is the long delay which takes place between
the initiation of legislation and its implementation. While
there have been welcome examples of urgently needed
corrective legislation being enacted with commendable
speed, these are far from the norm.
The primary fault is that of our legislators, not merely
because our Parliament has so few sitting days, but also
because the members seem reluctant to devote much of
the limited parliamentary time which is available to the
detailed consideration of legislation at the committee
stage of bills. Instead they prefer to concentrate on the
broader areas of second readings of bills, departmental
estimates and budget debates.
It is notorious that there is always a queue of bills
waiting to obtain parliamentary time. In such a situation
it would be difficult to blame the departments responsible
for the promotion of legislation for the length of time
which such legislation takes to reach the statute book. If
there is little prospect o f a bill being introduced in the
foreseeable future, then the work of consideration will
naturally expand. That there are dangers in over-
considering draft legislation has recently been highlighted
by the inclusion of the unnecessary definition of mortgage
as "including a charge" in the Building Societies Act,
1976. The inclusion of these words led to the refusal by
Building Societies to lend on the security of lands which
indemnified others against modest leasehold rents, a view
which was upheld by the High Court in the case of
Rafferty -v- Crowley, High Court, Murphy J. 24.6.83 —
unreported, and necessitated the rectifying Building
Societies Act, 1983.
The process whereby the "heads" of a bill are circulated
to all government departments which may have an
interest in the matters covered by the proposed bill may
slow down the process considerably, particularly if there
are inter-departmental differences of opinion, as
reportedly there are in relation to the enactment into Irish
legislation of the United Nations Convention on Human
Rights.
As a result of these various influences we seem to have
no regular programme of updating legislation. The
penalties imposed by statutes have become totally eroded
by inflation, as have any other monetary limits imposed.
Consolidation of "live" statutes has only been
attempted in a limited number of areas, such as that of tax
and social welfare. It is urgently needed in many more; the
areas of licensing, planning, company law and landlord
and tenant come readily to mind, if s ome of the resources
currently devoted to the Statute Law Reform Office or the
Law Reform Commission could be devoted to a regular
review and consolidation of our laws, then the burden
which lawyers presently bear of trying to identify the
precise statutory provisions which are in force on any
particular matter would be lightened. •
268