Lawyers in fight for €2,500-a-day Tribunal fees

THE Government is set for a bruising showdown with barristers over its decision to slash legal fees in a bid to stem the escalating costs of Tribunals.

Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy yesterday announced that, from September, senior counsels hired for new Tribunals or inquiries would no longer be able to command fees of between €2,000 and €2,500 per day.

Instead, fees will be set at well under half that rate and will be based on the salary of a High Court judge.

The remuneration for senior counsels will be pegged at €969 per day, with that of junior counsels at €646 per day. Nor will lawyers be entitled to once-off brief fees of up to €60,000.

More contentiously, the Minister yesterday confirmed the new fee structure will apply not only to new Tribunals but to existing Tribunals such as Moriarty and Mahon.

Legal sources said yesterday that any attempt to impose the new structure would be sure to meet with resistance from barristers at Tribunals. They predicted that some were sure to leave if their fees were reduced.

A Government spokesman said that the Attorney-General has already written to Tribunal chairpersons asking them to estimate how long their enquiries would continue.

Department of Finance sources said that moves would be made to impose the new structure “sooner rather than later”, certainly within six to twelve months, for existing Tribunals.

The nine Tribunals and Inquiries established by the State since 1997 have already cost over €100 million in legal costs.

However, the Dáil Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was told earlier this year that overall costs would amount to a further €300 million. One PAC member, FF’s Sean Fleming said they may cost over €1 billion.

At the Fianna Fáil Ard Fheis, Mr McCreevy said that some barristers now earned more in a day what those on the average industrial wage earned in a month and vowed to face down the problem.

A Finance source said yesterday the new structure would also apply to the costs of witnesses.

Conor Maguire, chairman of the Bar Council, questioned the changes.

“I find it difficult to understand how it suddenly can be changed in a unilateral basis between them and the Government,” he said.

Mr Maguire added: “It remains to be seen that if the rate they are setting out will attract barristers of the quality and calibre that they have had before.”

However, the Law Society Director General Ken Murphy welcomed the change, describing the Tribunals as the “greatest disaster to befall the legal profession in Ireland.”

Identifying the daily fee as the biggest problem, he said a move was needed towards a fee structure calculated on a contractual salary basis.