Insurance
SMDF: Vote no
Even if the SMDF is not insolvent, it is possibly suggesting that it will not pay out on some at least of valid claims against solicitor members of the SMDF. Why do the members not top-up the “mutual fund” that is the SMDF, to meet those claims? On the figures provided by the SMDF, this would cost the members approximately €1000 per year. According to the Council of the Law Society, the prospects of them agreeing to this are “slim”, but they have not been tested.
SMDF: Darkness in Summer
Consider; the Council shows no sign of devoting energy to meeting the challenge of the IMF/ECB bailout terms; instead it is navel gazing at a failed project of the past.
SMDF: What may the Law Society do?
To find out what the Law Society may do in relation to PI insurance for solicitors, just read Section 26 of the Solicitors (Amendment) Act 1984;
SMDF: Futility, Hypocrisy
The Council of the Law Society is about to crash and burn, whatever the outcome of the postal poll.
SMDF: Council Duties
t is a breach of corporate law and good governance to allow such a situation to arise, Even if the proposal is carried, it is open to challenge in the High Court because of the breach of fiduciary duty by the Council.
SMDF: Conflicts of Interest
They have no interest in justifying the proposed SMDF bailout by reference to statute. Even it they did, they would have a problem; there is no statutory power in the Law Society to levy a bailout of the SMDF on Law Society members.
SMDF: Constraints
The Law Society does not have that statutory power.
SMDF: Chutzpah
An unknown number of the Council members of the Law Society are insured with the SMDF. They are, consequently, members of the SMDF. Although unknown, the number must be large because they chose as their spokesman a person who is a member of the SMDF.
SMDF: A case of domestic violence?
The bailout by the Law Society will allow them, like war criminals amongst refugees, to discard their “uniforms”, destroy their party records and vanish, for a time at least, into the general population of innocent solicitors.
SMDF: Madness
The Council of the Law Society has denied that the author of the supportive opinion on the Council’s bailout plan is Dermot Gleeson SC, former Chairman of Aillied Irish Banks. The denial came weeks after a journalist cited him as the author of a critical opinion commissioned by the Council.