You'll never sue the Irish

Our thousands of readers will know that we don't normally promote arguments whereby events in the Republic of Ireland might blaze a trail for the rest of the world. So we draw your attention to just such an argument, made by the Wall Street Journal for a situation where it's plausible: litigation reform. The article (subs. req'd) recounts the recent history of civil lawsuit reform in the Republic, and with the same issue being a priority for Dubya's 2nd term, it's just possible that there is some relevant experience.

First and foremost of course, the difference: lawsuit reform in the Republic is a matter of one piece of legislation covering the entire country; for the USA, it's the alignment of 51 separate legal frameworks. Anyway, as the WSJ explains, the issue sprang up somewhat suddenly in the Republic -- a surge in claims beginning about 5 years ago, with many high profile exposes of dubious slip-and-fall lawsuits, incidents either staged or due to extreme drunkeness.

We don't have much evidence for this belief, but we've suspected that Ireland's small size and homogeneity makes it prone to fads, and it does appear that the filing of dodgy lawsuits became a mini-fad, perhaps justified by the thought that it's just a write off for someone else, but nonetheless blamed on those Americans when things seemed to be getting out of hand.

Enter Pat McDonagh, supremo of homegrown burger chain Supermac's to successfully lead a lobby group for reform, the key component of which is compulsory arbitration for civil damages claims. Crucially though, for anyone looking for implications for the US, medical malpractice is not covered by the reform. But standard slip-and-fall cases go before the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, no lawyers at the hearings, and the case only proceeds to a regular court when both sides reject the arbitration decision.

Unfortunately for the Journal, their story was printed on the same day that the High Court struck down the restriction on claimants retaining a lawyer (solicitor) for the hearings. While the US is not considering compulsory arbitration of civil claims, there is the related issue of whether a claimant has a right of access to state courts, whereas Dubya's plan is to force these claims into federal court.

Finally, there's definitely one thing that the US tort reform lobbyists shouldn't borrow from their successful Irish counterparts. Their slogan: Irish Business -- Are you being scalped to pay for a wig?