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Society. He was a good friend to our Society and
to many of us. We will miss him very much.
It is my duty as President at this half yearly
meeting to review briefly the main activities of the
Society and to render an interim report of my
stewardship since I took office as President from
my predecessor, Mr. O'Reilly. During Mr. O'Reilly's
most successful year of office, he had steered through
the Council, and the various Committees which
considered them, all the necessary regulations under
the Solicitors' Act, 1954. We are now settling down
to the work of implementing these regulations and
dealing with various queries which are bound to
arise. We shall, no doubt, in the course of time,
find tnat the regulations are not perfect and they
may require amendment in one or other respect;
however, we have not so far found any serious
defects, and we hope that with the assistance of the
Local Bar Associations, we shall be able to operate
them moothly and effectively for the benefit both
of the public and the profession.
The Regulations which have been made by the
Council so far deal with the following subjects :—
Apprenticeship and. Education.
Procedure on applications to the Disciplinary
Committee.
Procedure on applications for grants out of
the Compensation Fund.
The Solicitors' Accounts Regulations.
The
Professional
Practice,
Conduct
and
Discipline Regulations.
Regulations dealing with the issue of Practising
Certificates.
The Professional Practice, Conduct and Discipline
Regulations came into operation on ist October,
1955 and were printed in the Society's
Gazette.
They
will be circulated to all our members.
To the
majority they mean little because they embody a
code which has always been understood and acted
upon by solicitors of standing, but they do enable
the Society to take action where necessary to control
and prevent abuses of practice which tend to bring
discredit upon the profession.
The Solicitors' Accounts Regulations will come
into operation on ist January, 1957, and as both
these and the Accounts Regulations are of vital
interest to members, we have prepared and will
very shortly send to every member of the profession
a booklet containing the text of the Accounts an
the Professional Practice Regulations with explana
tory notes. The Council have also caused a model
system of book-keeping to be prepared by a firm
of accountants, setting out the principal books
which are or should be kept by solicitors, with
rulings of the columrs used, and instructions on
the installation and operation of the system. As
from ist January next, a practising solicitor will be
under a statutory obligation to maintain and keep
written up to date proper books of accounts, showing
all monies received for clients and distinguishing;
these monies from his own. The Council thought
that it would be helpful to solicitors and accountants
who audit solicitors' books to have a model book
keeping system with an explanation in everyday
non-technical language. Many solicitors already have
systems of book-keeping which have been operated
for a number of years.
If any existing method
complies with the essential requirements of the
Accounts Regulations there will be no necessity to
make any change but young solicitors starting in
practice and others whose systems of book-keeping
may be capable of improvement may find it advan
tageous to study the model prepared by the Society's
accountants.
If as
is expected the method outlined in the
Society's booklet is adopted by a large number of
members, the Society will probably place an order
with a firm of printers for producing a large number
of the sheets with the headngs and rulings suggested
for sale to members of the Society. Many solicitors,
nowadays, use loose leaf ledgers and cash books
and it would -be quite a simple matter to produce
the sheets in quantities for binding into existing
folders.
Retirement Benefits.
It is hardly necessary to remind this audience that
the professional man is not tne favourite child of
the Welfare State—or at least the modified version
of it which we have in this country. The self-
employed professional man such as the barrister,
solicitor, accountant or doctor, particularly the
solicitor who has to maintain an office and pay an
office staff, suffer acutely from the ever-rising price
index, which affects both his personal cost of living
and the cost of running an office.
Furthermore,
the high rate of income tax now prevailing, makes
it impossible for any self-employed person
to
provide for old age or retirement. And in fact a
glance around will show that solicitors have to die
in harness and that there is no such thing as a solicitor
in a position to enjoy a leisurely old age on the
income from his accumulated savings. The Council
were struck by the anomaly, which prevails between
the position of employed workers, many of whom
enjoy sheltered occupations and very favourable
salaries and conditions with the position of the
solicitor who
is often in a comparatively un
favourable financial position. There seems to be no
adequate reason—as a measure of fiscal justice—why
a self-employed man should receive less favourable
treatment in the matter of taxation of contributions