Compliance & Regulation
SRA issues hefty fine for solicitor who ignored conflict between clients
A solicitor who acted for both sides in the transfer of five properties for nil value has been hit with a £12,000 fine by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
Solicitor to face tribunal over “threatening” Covid letters to GPs
A solicitor is set to face a disciplinary tribunal for aggressively threatening GPs with legal action if the doctor did not provide a Covid vaccination exemption for their client.
Law firm culture key to ethical practice, says Law Society president
Law firm cultures where solicitors are able to admit and learn from mistakes are central to ensuring adherence to professional ethics, the president of the Law Society said yesterday.
Law firm fined for dealing with CMC and not its clients
A personal injury firm which did not deal directly with clients referred by a claims management company over six years has been fined by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
Law firm’s PII covers claim to return £7.5m fee, Court of Appeal rules
A claim seeking the return of a £7.5m success fee earned by a law firm for its role in a giant transaction is covered by its professional indemnity insurance, the Court of Appeal has ruled.
Bar Council to meet Can’t Buy My Silence over NDAs
The Bar Council is to meet non-disclosure agreement pressure group Can’t Buy My Silence in the wake of its criticism of the barrister body’s stance.
Four in ten crime solicitor-advocates “lack proper learning plans”
Nearly half of criminal law solicitors-advocates lack proper learning and development plans, research by the Solicitors Regulation Authority has indicated.
“Power kick” solicitor struck off for fake employee fraud
A solicitor who used her positions as head of corporate services at a council and chair of trustees at a cancer charity to defraud both of them by paying money to a fake employee has been struck off.
Exclusive: Weinstein whistleblower attacks Bar Council over NDAs stance
The woman who first broke a Harvey Weinstein non-disclosure agreement has strongly criticised the Bar Council for dismissing the growing evidence of NDA abuse.
Solicitor “pressured by boss” to breach accounts rules
A solicitor was pressured by his boss to give another law firm buying property searches procured for a previous buyer his personal bank account details for the £100 it was paying.
Blog
The new metrics for success in conveyancing
While technology has made much of the conveyancing process faster, there remains a practical limit to how many matters anyone can manage while still keeping standards intact.
The UK legal market is polarising – and the middle is disappearing
Consolidation and the boutique boom are not contradictory. They are the same market stretching apart at both ends – and it changes what your firm is worth, and to whom.
Conveyancing’s consistency problem is about pressure, not skills
When I qualified, a conveyancer had perhaps 10 or 12 plates to keep spinning. Today’s conveyancers have 20 or 30, and almost none of the room for error I had starting out.
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