The Gazette 1988

GAZETTE INCORPORATE D LAWSOCIETY OFIRELAND

APRIL 1 988

GAZETTE

In this Issue { Viewpoint

Vol.82 No.3April 1988

Viewpoint Too Many Cooks?

59

Advertising: The Great Debate or the Great Mistake Bar Association News

Counsel system is the requirement to brief Junior Counsel. Junior Counsel plays little or no part in the hearing of the average personal injury action but yet is entitled to be paid two-thirds of the Senior Counsel's brief fee. A justification for this is that Junior Counsel is being belatedly recompensed for the work which he has done at pre- liminary stages of the case in drafting all the formal documents and indeed on occasion writing the opinion on the basis of which the proceedings have been launched. The fees paid for this work do not c omp e n s a te Jun i or Counsel adequately for the time and skill involved. However, to make it up to Junior Counsel by allowing him to collect substantial fees for work which he manifestly does not do is hard to justify. In addition Junior Counsel will come off badly in any case which is settled prior to the issue of briefs to Senior Counsel in that he will only have received the inadequate reward of his earlier fees. The requirement to instruct Junior Counsel in judicial proceedings was abandoned by the English Bar some 30 years ago w i t h o ut disastrous consequences for the Bar. Far from squeezing Junior Counsel out of the High Court, as might have been feared, they are regularly to be found conducting actions wi t hout the benefit of a Senior and have a virtual monopoly of County Court work. A similar development in this jurisdiction might not only lead to a reduction in fees in personal injury actions but also be to the benefit of the Junior Bar. An extension of the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court would mean that Junior Counsel would have an opportunity of presenting cases of considerable importance which would be a valuable preparation for future work at the Senior Bar. A later Ministerial pronouncement t ook t he ma t t er further. The Minister for Justice is to be given power to limit the number of Counsel appearing in personal injury cases to one which seems to suggest that Junior Counsel will, in High Court cases, be excluded. Contd. on pago 62. 59

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The recent decision of the Bar of Ireland, apparently at the behest of the Minister for State for Trade, to restrict the number of Senior Counsel to be briefed in personal injuries actions in the High Court does have its puzzling aspects. It has always been explained by the Bar Council that the need to brief t wo Counsel in such cases flowed from the manner in which such actions are listed for hearing in the High Court. Relying on the virtual certainty that a high proportion of cases listed for hearing on any given day will be settled prior to the commencement of the hearing, app r ox ima t e ly four t imes t he number of cases that actually could be given a hearing are put into each week's lists. In order to ensure that a Senior Counsel will be available to conduct each case that does go on for hearing it became the p r ac t i ce to brief t wo Senior Counsel in each case. Such Counsel were not briefed on the basis t h at t hey wo u ld give exclusive attention to the particular case and not take on any other briefs for the probable dates of the hearing. Accordingly the fees of each Counsel were no more than half what they would have charged as a single Senior giving the case exclusive attention. It the total of Counsels' fees is to be reduced it would seem that the listing system will have to be changed in order to allow single Seniors to take cases secure in the knowledge that they will be able to conduct the hearing, at fees which would be less than those at present being charged by the t wo Seniors who are currently being briefed. A change in the listing system whereby dates for hearing are allocated on a f i xed basis, such as t h at operating for non-jury actions must surely lead to a smaller number of cases being disposed of each term. Certainly the experience of other Common Law jurisdictions where fixed-date systems operate is that the time lag between setting down for trial and hearing is excessive. There is a view wh i ch suggests that the real anomaly in the three

A View from Vienna 64 Irish Legal History Society 65 Professional Indemnity Scheme 67 From the President 69 Practice Notes 71 People & Places 72 Corroboration Requirement in relation to Sexual Complainants 75 Correspondence 79 Professional Information 81

E x t c u t i v* Editor: Mary Gaynor Committee: Geraldine Clarke, Chairman

Seamus Brennan John F. Buckley Gary Byrne Michael Carrigan Jim Hickey

Nathaniel Lacy Frank Lanigan Charles R. M. Meredith Desmond Moran Daire Murphy John Schutte Maxwell Sweeney

Advertising: Liam 0 hOisin. Telephone: 305236 307860 Printing: Turner's Printing Co. Ltd., Longford. The views expressed in this publication, save where otherwise 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 does not necessarily indicate approval by the Society for the product or service advertised. Published at Blackhall Race, Dublin 7. Tel.: 710711. Telex: 31219. Fex: 710704.