PART X.

Miscellaneous.

72. —(1) Stamp duty shall not be charged on the admission of a person as a solicitor or on a practising certificate.

(2) For the reference to £80 contained in the First Schedule to the Stamp Act, 1891, under the first of the headings “ARTICLES OF CLERKSHIP” there shall be substituted a reference to £14.

73. —(1) The Council may appoint a committee for any purpose which the Council consider would be better effected by means of a committee and may delegate to the committee, with or without restrictions, the exercise of any functions of the Council.

(2) The number of members of a committee under this section and their term of office shall be fixed by the Council.

(3) A committee under this section may include persons who are not members of the Council, but—

(a) at least two-thirds of the members of the committee shall be members of the Council, and

(b) where functions of the Society which are performable by the Council are delegated to the committee, the committee shall consist wholly of members of the Council.

(4) Where functions of the Society which are performable by the Council are delegated to a committee under this section, the quorum of the committee shall be three.

(5) The Council shall ensure that no member of the Disciplinary any Committee shall act as a member of any committee under this section concerned with complaints against solicitors.

74. —The Society shall be entitled, without payment of any fee, to inspect the file of proceedings in bankruptcy relating to a solicitor against whom proceedings in bankruptcy have been taken and to be supplied with office copies of the proceedings on payment of the usual charge for such copies.

75. —For the purposes of a statutory provision or custom whereby the qualification of a solicitor for holding an office depends on his having been admitted and enrolled for a particular period, that period shall, in the case of a solicitor who before admission was a barrister, be reckoned as if he had been admitted and enrolled on the date on which he was called to the bar.

76. —The limitation in the Charters of the Society on the value of land to be held by the Society shall cease to have effect.

77. —(1) An offence under this Act may be prosecuted by the Society.

(2) Notwithstanding any provision in any Act specifying the period within which summary proceedings may be commenced, proceedings in respect of an offence under this Act may be commenced at any time within the period of three months from the date on which evidence, sufficient in the opinion of the Society to justify a prosecution, comes to their knowledge, or within the period of twelve months after the commission of the offence, whichever period last expires.

(3) For the purposes of subsection (2) of this section, a certificate issued by the Society as to the date on which such evidence as aforesaid came to their knowledge shall be conclusive evidence thereof.

78. —Notwithstanding the provisions of their Charters, the Society shall make any amendments in the bye-laws of the Society that are necessary to bring them into conformity with this Act and the regulations made thereunder.

79. —(1) A regulation, certificate, notice or other document made or issued by the Society may be signed on behalf of the Society by the president of the Society, the secretary of the Society, or the registrar, or by any officer of the Society nominated for that purpose by the Council.

(2) Prima facie evidence of a regulation, certificate, notice or other document made or issued by the Society may be given by production of a document purporting to be a copy thereof and to be signed as specified in subsection (1) of this section.

80. —A notice or other document which is required or authorised by or under this Act to be served on any person may, without prejudice to any other method of service, be served by sending it by registered post in an envelope addressed to the person at his last known place of business or residence.

81. —A practising solicitor shall give notice to the registrar of any change in his place of business or places of business within fourteen days after the change is made, and the registrar shall record the change by amending the latest entry relating to the solicitor in the register of practising solicitors.

82. —(1) There shall be paid to the Society, in respect of the applications mentioned in the Sixth Schedule to this Act, such fees as may be prescribed for those applications respectively.

(2) Regulations prescribing fees for the applications referred to in paragraphs 1 to 6 of the Sixth Schedule to this Act shall require the concurrence of the Chief Justice.

(3) Different fees may be prescribed pursuant to this section for a first application to attend an examination and any subsequent application by the same applicant to attend that examination.

(4) Where a fee is prescribed pursuant to this section in respect of an application, payment thereof shall be a condition precedent to the entertainment of the application.

83. —(1) The Superior Court Rules Committee may make rules of court for the purposes of—

(a) applications and appeals under this Act to the Chief Justice, and

(b) applications under this Act to the President of the High Court.

(2) An order made on any such application or appeal may contain such provisions with respect to costs as the Chief Justice or the President of the High Court (as the case may be) considers proper.

84. —(1) A reference in any enactment to a solicitor, attorney or proctor shall be construed as a reference to a solicitor within the meaning of this Act.

(2) A reference in any enactment to the registrar of attorneys and solicitors shall be construed as a reference to the registrar within the meaning of this Act.

85. —To remove doubt, it is hereby declared that the Attorneys' and Solicitors' Act, 1870, applies, and always applied, in the State.

86. —Nothing in this Act shall affect any rights or privileges of persons who are solicitors or assistant solicitors to the Revenue Commissioners or require any such person, or any clerk or officer acting for him, to be admitted or enrolled or to hold a practising certificate.

87. —Nothing in this Act shall affect any provision made by or under statute or by common law by which an unqualified person is authorised to conduct, defend or otherwise act in relation to any action, suit or matter.

88. —(1) A person who is not a solicitor and who has passed any examination under the Solicitors (Ireland) Act, 1898, or under section 4 of the Legal Practitioners (Qualification) Act, 1929 (No. 16 of 1929), shall be deemed to have passed the corresponding examination under this Act.

(2) Where at the commencement of this section, a solicitor has two apprentices, he may retain them until the expiration of their indentures as if he had obtained the consent of the Society under subsection (2) of section 36 of this Act.

(3) Any admission, appointment, approval, fee, notice, certificate, instrument, order, rule, regulation, direction, appeal or proceeding under or for the purposes of an enactment repealed by this Act shall be treated as being under or for the purposes of the corresponding enactment of this Act, and—

(a) any such order, rule or regulation shall remain in force until corresponding provision is made under this Act, and

(b) any such proceeding which was brought before the committee established under section 34 of the Solicitors (Ireland) Act, 1898, and which stood not completed immediately before the commencement of this section shall be completed by the Disciplinary Committee in like manner as if this Act had not been passed.

(4) From the commencement of this section until the first appointment under subsection (1) of section 13 of this Act, the Disciplinary Committee shall consist of the persons who immediately before the commencement of this section were the members of the committee established under section 34 of the Solicitors (Ireland) Act, 1898.