Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

With regard to Deputy McGrath’s amendment, it is a pity that we have absent friends.

My amendments Nos. 170 and 171 provide that the authority will engage in two separate public consultation processes under sections 86 and 87, respectively, rather than the one consultation process which the published Bill had envisaged. Under section 86 the authority will engage in a consultation process with regard to the regulation, monitoring and operation of legal partnerships and multidisciplinary practices, MDPs. This consultation will feed into the exercise of the regulatory power of the new authority regarding business structures. It is envisaged that the authority will conduct the initial consultation process within six months following its establishment and not within 18 months as in the published Bill. The report of the section 86 public consultation process, once completed, will be presented to the Minister who will have it laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas. The Minister will also at that time furnish the report to Cabinet, along with details of the proposed date of commencement of the legal partnerships and multidisciplinary practices provided for under sections 72 and 74.

Section 86 also envisages that the authority may carry out other periodic consultations on the regulation, monitoring and operation of legal partnerships and MDPs. The authority under section 87 will carry out a separate public consultation process in respect of the manner in which a barrister may hold clients’ moneys and whether the current restrictions on barristers receiving instructions on a contentious matter directly from a person who is not a solicitor should be retained or removed. This consultation process is now to be completed within 12 months of the establishment of the new regulatory authority. The Bill, as members know, originally published prescribed a period also of 18 months with the relevant report to be laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas by the Minister within 30 days.