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Muttley Dastardly LLP: Abusus non tollit usum… Abuse of a right does not invalidate use

The Partners of Muttley Dastardly LLP meet in closed session each Friday at 10.00 am. 

Following the unfortunate departure from the firm of managing partner Matt Muttley in the summer of 2011, Dr Erasmus Strangelove has taken over the leadership of the firm as CEO and Senior Partner.

A transcript of Dr Strangelove’s speech follows….

Gentlemen,

Good morning. Six months has passed since Matt Muttley’s unfortunate demonstration to a group of RBS Bankers of the toughness of the glass encasing our building and his subsequent departure from the firm abiit ad maiores….he has gone to the ancestors…or by virtue of death,  as our Partnership agreement provides in Paragraph 48 (a)(iii) and The Schedule of Terminating Events. As Quintillian observed… deficit omne quod nasciture …Everything that is born passes away.

I know three of you saw him plummet to the ground from his office as you sat in your offices.  I am pleased to announce that our litigation department has been able to bring successful claims in damages for nervous shock against Muttley’s estate for the three partners affected ….and, most pleasingly, in negligence, Rylands v Fletcher  and economic loss,  for losses sustained by the firm in relation to the repair of the glass and lost billings for our attendance at his funeral.  The claims brought by the three visiting bankers from RBS against the firm have been kicked into the long grass by a most ingenious use of the European Convention and our very own Human Rights Act….  by an associate in the litigation department.  She tells me that Article  8 of The European Convention gives us a right to privacy – which is rather pleasing for our affairs generally – and that her 7400 page opinion on this highly complex matter will tax lawyers acting for RBS for some time…. abusus non tollit usum… or as we say in the modern parlance…. Abuse of a right does not invalidate use .

Turning now to matters of import and our future.  I sent you all a copy of Professor Richard Moorhead’s excellent article in Legal Week : The minimum salary for trainees: in real trouble this time.  Professor Moorhead is a professor at Cardiff University.  Cardiff is in Wales.   I quote the opening passage for your consideration…

Every time there is a recession, the solicitors’ profession likes to reconsider minimum salaries for its trainees. For a while this was a kind of annual sport. Chairs of the Trainee Solicitors’ Group and the Young Solicitors’ Group Lawyers (I did both jobs back in the days when the Law Society Council was busy tearing itself apart) would be invited into the Law Society equivalent of smoke-filled rooms (biscuits and too-strong, rather rank coffee) to be told that they were standing between hundreds of new training contract places and they should allow the abolition of minimum salaries.

At some point (usually at the then well-lubricated Council dinners) they would be approached by the Law Society Council member they were most friendly with to be told: don’t ask for an increase and everything will be alright. They duly, usually, did that and everyone claimed common sense had prevailed. We know what both Len McCluskey and Ed Milliband would say.

Gentlemen, please cast your votes to approve my memorandum to all trainees: Don’t ask for an increase and everything will be alright.

(The Partners vote using electronic keypads)

Thank you Gentlemen for your unanimous support.

I turn now to the second item on the agenda which will be of particular reference to our Corporate partners.  Legal Week reports this morning that former Mishcon de Reya property partner Kevin Steele has been sentenced to five and a half years in jail after being found guilty of forgery and fraud offences in a €22m (£18.5m) loan scam.  Given the current agitation on twitter about bankers’ bonuses, government cutting legal aid and a 36% reduction in government  legal spend – adroitly seeded by our Social Media Psyops unit –  it may be an idea for corporate partners to pass this information on to clients with a complimentary copy of our Briefing Paper on The Bribery Act and suggest a client site visit to enable us to do a thorough compliance audit. If you approve, I shall draw up a suitably frightening client letter… pour encourager les punters…as I like to call these communications.

(The Partners vote using electronic keypads)

Thank you Gentlemen for your unanimous support.

Finally…. a bit of light relief.  RollonFriday.com reports…. Norton Rose sends clients home after training cock-up… I quote…

There were red faces at Norton Rose this week when clients who had turned up for a training session were left waiting around before finally being sent home.

It seems no one had told the firm’s admin staff that the event had been cancelled before Christmas. So they had sent emails to the clients reminding them to come along, and a group of around 20 of them arrived at the firm’s London Bridge offices on Tuesday morning, looking forward to a briefing on contract terms. Usually clients would be ushered into a swish conference room and fed coffee and bacon rolls before a sales pitch masquerading as a training session. But instead they were left waiting for half an hour until a shame-faced member of security staff finally ushered them out.

I would like to reference this story as an “And finally”  in the firm’s weekly newsletter to corporate clients.

(The Partners vote using electronic keypads)

Thank you Gentlemen for your unanimous support.  That concludes the business for today’s meeting.  Strength & Profits.

(The Partners rise and respond….”Strength & Profits”)

***

With thanks to the following for sponsoring the free materials for students on Insite Law magazine: Inksters Solicitors, Cellmark,  BPP University College, David Phillips & Partners Solicitors, Wildy & Sons, Camps Solicitors accident claims

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