If, in a post outcomes-focused regulation world, all new firms have been given a clean bill of health by their regulator, there is a case for reopening the assigned risks pool to them because there might be other, less good reasons that they have not been able to obtain insurance, particularly if they are BME firms.

Uncertainty in how rules and regulations are interpreted is the very stuff of being a lawyer, but solicitors may well be less keen on this when the uncertain rules and regulations are the ones which govern how they operate. But as Solicitors Regulation Authority chief executive Antony Townsend admitted earlier this week, that is what outcomes-focused regulation will introduce to their world.

A recent survey released by outsourcing consultancy Fronterion revealed a rising interest in onshore and hybrid on/offshore legal outsourcing arrangements. The 2010 Global Sourcing Study polled ten of the top 20 UK law firms and 17 of the world’s largest legal outsourcing vendors, and found that some 300 legal professionals in the UK currently provide onshore legal outsourcing services to UK clients.

As we reported yesterday, the results of the economic impact analysis commissioned by the Legal Services Board concluded that the consumer does not suffer any detriment. The hard truth is that if they are not distorting the market, the argument to ban them is hard to maintain. But I am not entirely convinced by the research. The conclusions that the researchers, Charles River Associates, came to on the basis of the evidence before them seem fair enough. What bothers me slightly is whether they really sought enough evidence. It feels a touch superficial to me.

Everyone’s favourite game at the moment is trying to predict what the new team at the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) means for the key legal policy issues in the Lord Chancellor’s in-tray.