Terry Leyden (Fianna Fail)

I sincerely welcome the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, to the House. I appreciate very much the fact that she has taken time to discuss this Private Members' Bill. I also welcome the Register General, Kieran Feely, to the House. I thank my party for giving me time to bring the Bill to the House. The Bill was passed in Private Members' time in the House in 2006 or 2007 but due to difficulties with getting Dáil time, it was not passed there.

I will provide the House with some background on why I feel the Bill would be of assistance. The country has approximately 2,100 legal practices. These are individual solicitor's offices, each with a wills book which is retained by the practice. The difficulty is that no record of a will having been made exists outside of the practice. This is becoming a greater difficulty given the increased mobility of people because after having made a will, people move to live in a different town and the same link does not exist between a person and a solicitor with many clients as it did in the past between a person and a family solicitor. A further complication has arisen since the Bill was first passed by the House as some legal practices have gone out of business.

I have personal experience of constituents coming to me trying to find their wills which is why I suggest this Bill should be passed. Jack Lemmon once said, "death ends life, not a relationship". The Law Society Gazette has pages and pages of advertisements from people searching for lost wills and hoping their loved ones made a will. Many people make wills not knowing that sometimes they may not be executed. We have a responsibility to ensure the citizens' wishes are honoured and given the proper legal recognition they deserve. Anyone, particularly solicitors, who have experience of the Law Society Gazette of June 2001 will know there are numerous advertisements seeking lost wills. According to the old saying where there is a will, there is a way. I hope there is a way with this Bill.

The Bill will provide a clear statutory basis for the registration of wills by extending the civil registration system which will enable a person making a will, or his or her solicitor, to register the details of the custodian of the will, thus reducing the risk of a will remaining unknown or being found belatedly.

The Bill amends the Civil Registration Act 2004 and provides a clear statutory basis for the registration of wills by extending the Civil Registration Service. The register of wills would be kept in the General Register's Office in Roscommon, further facilitating decentralisation to Roscommon. Having the register of deaths, births and marriages in Roscommon has been a tremendous boost to the town and surrounding areas. It has also provided a great service to members of the public.

The study found that 75% of people do not have a will, in other words, more than two thirds of adults have not written a will according to new research. The survey for Irish Life also revealed that more than half of parents do not have the relevant legal documents in place and of the 75% who indicated they had not made a will, more than one third believed they were too young to make one and almost one fifth believed they did not need one. These figures were reported in a newspaper article published on 24 September 2010. The Registration of Wills Bill 2011 will give people confidence in the process of making a will. In 2010, a small proportion of wills made - 11,625 - went to probate.

I will outline some of the main provisions of the Bill. Part 1 contains the usual provisions for a Short Title, collective citation, definitions and commencement. Part 2 outlines the organisational structure for the administration of the register of wills. Part 3 provides for the registration of wills. Part 4 provides for miscellaneous amendments to the Civil Registration Act 2004.

Section 10 provides for the registration of wills by a registrar of any local registration authority. Qualified informants may register wills at a convenient office by providing the required particulars of the will and signing the register in the presence of the registrar. A qualified informant is the testator or his or her instructed solicitor. The required particulars of the will are set out in the Schedule and include the name and address of the custodian of the will, the testator's signature, name, address, sex, date and place of birth and personal public service number, the informant's signature and name and address, the date of registration and the registrar's signature. Subsection (3) provides that one or more wills, including codicils, made by the same testator may be registered or re-registered. This means that if a person decides to change his or her will, he or she can register or at least indicate the location of the new will.

Section 11 provides that information held in the register of wills shall not be accessible to members of the public and or made available except as provided for under section 12. This ensures the privacy of will records. I emphasise that the will would not be held in the General Register Officer but either by the testator or a solicitor's office or in another safe location identified in the registration.

Section 12 requires the Registrar General or a member of his or her staff authorised by him or her to search the register of wills and provide a certified copy of an entry in such register at the request of an applicant on payment of the appropriate fee, provided the death of the testator has been registered or the applicant is the testator. This means that a copy of the registered entry is only available to the testator or someone else on the death of the testator.

The further modernisation of the civil registration service through the introduction of the Registration of Wills Bill 2011 is essential to ensure rights for those who made wills in this life and their beneficiaries. In 1972, the Council of Europe made recommendations on the establishment of a European registration of wills. Given current levels of mobility and the development of the European Union, this proposal could be considered.

The difficulty I experienced when I had a similar Bill passed in the Seanad was that I was unable to secure time in the Dáil. In addition, registration and the general register office were transferred from the then Department of Health and Children to the then Department of Social and Family Affairs. This created further delays and difficulties.

Contacts with various Ministers and Departments and the outcome of cases before the courts may give rise to a requirement to introduce legislation. I was aware of an individual - I do not propose to name him - who was confident his father had made a will but was unable to locate it on his father's death. He visited every solicitors office in his locality without success and felt very aggrieved that the last will of his father had not been made or his wishes had not been honoured because the will had not been found. This occurs frequently and gives rise to considerable difficulties. It is important, therefore, that persons who decide to make a will can avail of a central facility to register the will. Some solicitors offices are highly conscientious in these matters and will make every effort to find out when a person who made a will died. It is sometimes difficult, however, to locate people because the population has become highly mobile. Someone from a rural area, for instance, could make a will in Dublin and, on his or her death, contact is not made with the family because the testator's solicitor is not aware that he or she has died. A further danger is that will books and wills become mislaid in solicitors practices. The cost of storage has also become a problem, especially for solicitors in urban areas.

One cannot introduce a law imposing fines on solicitors who fail to register a will. A voluntary approach based on persuasion must be adopted at this stage. In that regard, the proposals in the Bill are interim arrangements. At a certain point, however, the procedure should be that when a will is made a fee will be paid and the will sent to the General Register Office where it will be held securely and no one, other than the testator or, in the event of his or her death, the family of the testator, will have access to it. This would allow families, on the production of a death certificate, to check whether a will had been made and access its contents. This process will be slow but I hope at some point all wills registered in solicitors offices will be held at a central location.

I thank my colleagues in the Fianna Fáil Party for permitting me to introduce this Bill in Private Members' time. I also thank other parties. In 2006-07, when my party was in Government, my earlier Bill secured cross-party support in the House. I had hoped it would be introduced and passed in the Dáil to allow its enactment. Where there is a will, there is a way and I will seek to have the legislation enacted. I extend my best wishes to the Minister who has a difficult Ministry. I know she will do her utmost to make a great success of it.