LAW SOCIETY ANNUAL CONFERENCE:SOLICITORS NEED to learn more about European law so that they can offer a better service to their clients and expand their business, the Law Society annual conference in Kilkenny was told yesterday. Delegates were discussing how to develop business opportunities in the recession.
Director of the Irish Centre for European Law Andrew Beck said EU law trumped Irish law, and that between 60 and 70 per cent of Irish legislation annually implemented EU directives.
While this was particularly prominent in business law, where 70 per cent of the law came from the EU, few areas of Irish law were untouched by EU law, including sensitive areas like criminal law and family law, he said.
Knowledge of EU law enabled Irish lawyers to add value for their clients, advise them fully on their options and avoid negligence.
When considering any case, a solicitor should consider whether it had an EU law aspect and how this might help the client. Cases where this might arise included competition law, claiming compensation on termination of a commercial agency agreement, public procurement law and asylum law.
EU law provided for additional remedies to those available under Irish law, for example, damages for the non-implementation of directives, and additional and less costly procedural routes, like complaining to the EU Commission on a State-aid matter.
He pointed out that 450,000 probate cases in the EU annually, with an estimated value of €120 billion, involved an international element.
The EU was at present engaged in negotiations aimed at ending contradictory rulings between the courts of several EU states concerning the same estate, and establishing a single competent authority, in either the country of residence or of origin, to deal with the entire estate.
He warned that Irish lawyers could not safely apply the same thought processes to the analysis of EU legislation as they did of Irish legislation, and they would have to develop specific expertise in the European law area.
The solicitors’ profession has to consolidate upwards in firm size, Michael Lanigan told the conference. He said he had recently merged his firm with another local firm, and it was a positive experience.
Previously his firm had two solicitors, a legal executive and five support staff. It was mainly litigation oriented, with some conveyancing and probate. It was a very busy firm, and being the sole driver was a big burden. It was difficult to cover all the practice areas adequately and managing the firm was crisis-driven, he said.
He was not contemplating a merger when a colleague from another firm, Poe Kiely Hogan, invited him for “a coffee”, which sparked off the process, involving an independent facilitator. The process lasted five months.
Transferring the clients was the easy bit, but it took time, as it required a personal approach, he said. He warned delegates that partnership was not for them if they were uncomfortable with collective decision-making.