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Book-keeping Examination
AT the Book-keeping Examination for apprentices
to Solicitors, held on 29th May, the following passed
the examination :
Passed with Merit.
John K. Temple-Lang.
Passed.
Thomas C. Buckley, Michael J. Fitzsimons,
Valentine J. D. Kirwan, John Morrissey, Dominic
Mockler, Patrick G. McMahon, Thomas D. Shaw,
Daire Walsh.
ii candidates attended; 9 passed.
LIABILITY FOR PROFESSIONAL FEES.
Counsel's Opinion.
SENIOR COUNSEL gave these replies to the following
questions addressed to him on behalf of the Society
in which he was asked for an advisory opinion:
(1)
(a)
FEES FOR MEDICAL AND HOSPITAL TREAT–
MENT BEFORE LITIGATION included in the
amount of a settlement or verdict. Counsel
advises that this does not of itself impose upon
the solicitor any legal obligation to ensure
that the claim of the hospital or doctor where
particulars have been obtained is discharged
unless the solicitor gives an undertaking,
express or implied, to do so.
(b}
If the solicitor receives the amount of the
damages as a result of the assessment of
damages by the jury and that the damages
include hospital or medical expenses incurred
before litigation, here Counsel advises that
the solicitor will receive the money as the
agent for and with the authority of the client,
and that as no trust arises in favour of either
the hospital or the doctor, if the client requires
the money, it must usually be paid to him.
Where there is an agreed settlement of the
client's claim, the defendant's solicitor some–
times requires an undertaking arising out of
Section 174 of the Road Traffic Act 1933.
The plaintiff's solicitor who agrees to give
such undertaking, is personally liable for
carrying it out.
(2) MEDICAL REPORTS Where a solicitor acting
for a named client requests a doctor to make
an examination and report, Counsel advises
that the solicitor will not be personally liable
for the doctor's fee, unless, in addition to
making the request, he undertakes a personal
liability either expressly or by implication.
(3) ATTENDANCE OF DOCTORS
IN COURT
AS
WITNESSES : Counsel advises that as a result
of the cases of
Lee
v.
Everest
(2 H. & N. 285),
and
Robins
v.
Bridge
(3, M. & W. 114), a
solicitor acting for a named client is not liable
as an agent to a doctor for his medical fee
for attending Court, whether the solicitor has
caused
the doctor to be served with a
subpoena, or not, unless he undertakes
personal liability expressly or by implication.
(4) SOLICITORS' UNDERTAKING TO PAY WITNESSES'
FEES : If a solicitor has become personally
N
liable to witnesses for payment of their fees
(e.g., where he has given a personal under–
taking or held himself out as the principal),
he must, following
Miller
v.
Appleton
(50
Sol. J. 184) pay whatever fee was agreed upon
whether it is allowed on taxation or if some
of the claim is disallowed. If no fee has been
agreed upon, the witness is entitled to reason–
able remuneration, and what this will amount
to in any given case must be decided by the
Court on a
quantum meruit
basis if the amount
claimed is considered excessive.
(5) PERSONAL UNDERTAKINGS BY SOLICITORS:
These undertakings may in certain cases be
enforced summarily against a solicitor upon
application to the Court. Such an under–
taking may be enforced whether given to a
client or to a third person or to the Court,
but it is enforceable only if given by the
solicitor in his professional capacity and not
as an individual
(United Mining and Finance
Corporation
v.
Becher
(1910) 2, K.B. 296).
A solicitor might also be held responsible
if a custom can be proved that he should be
so held, and it is for the Court to decide
whether such a custom was proved. But a
solicitor was held not personally liable to a
photographer for ordering photos
to be
supplied for a trial, on the ground that he was
an agent for a named principal
(Wakefield
v.
Ducktvorth
(1950), i K.B. 218). On the other
hand a solicitor is personally responsible by
custom for the charges of a shorthand writer
employed to take a note of evidence in liti–
gation and for the costs of another solicitor
who does business for him, and it is therefore
incumbent on him to give express notice if
he wishes the business to be done on the
client's credit.
Counsel's opinion is a statement of the legal
position. The Council stated in the Society's
Gazette,
May, 1956, that the solicitor's professional duty is
coextensive with his legal liability although he may
voluntarily accept wider obligations. In this con–
nection reference was made to the statement pub–
lished in the Society's
Gazette,
November, 1954