The Trading of Unlimited Liability Bank Shares in Nineteenth Century Ireland: The Bagehot Hypothesis

In the mid-1820s, banks became the first businesses in Great Britain and Ireland to be allowed to form freely on an unlimited liability joint-stock basis. Walter Bagehot warned that their shares would ultimately be owned by widows, orphans, and other impecunious individuals. Another hypothesis is that the governing bodies of these banks, constrained by special legal restrictions on share trading, acted effectively to prevent such shares being transferred to the less wealthy. We test both conjectures using the archives of an Irish joint-stock bank. The results do not support Bagehot's hypothesis.

Freeing order processes in Northern Ireland: Painfully slow

Greg Kelly and Dominic McSherry describe the timescales involved in achieving freeing orders for 23 children in Northern Ireland between 1996 and 1999. There was delay at all stages in the process. The delays were particularly pronounced in social services and social services/legal services processes. The authors conclude that if adoption is to be made available to more children from state care, current arrangements, including legislation, will need revision and reform.