Compliance & Regulation
Now MP targets Herbert Smith over Post Office work
An MP has urged select committees to investigate the role of law firms – and in particular Herbert Smith Freehills – in helping client companies accused of wrongdoing set up compensation schemes.
Advocacy shake-up to hit trainees but not youth courts
The Solicitors Regulation Authority is to end the practice of allowing trainee solicitors to obtain higher rights of audience but has reversed course on its proposed approach to advocacy in the youth courts.
SRA to cut Compensation Fund payout limit to £500k
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has decided to implement its controversial plan to cut the maximum award from its Compensation Fund from £2m to £500,000.
SDT rejects a quarter of prosecution agreements
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal rejected a quarter of the outcomes agreed by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and defendants last year, its annual report has revealed.
Lawyers face new levy to support economic crime drive
Larger law firms face a new levy of £100-200 per £1m of revenue to support the government’s economic crime plan, under proposals outlined by the Treasury yesterday.
Lawyers have become “de facto agents of Russian state”
Lawyers have become “de facto agents of the Russian state” by helping to smooth the way of Russian money entering the UK, according to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee.
COFA banned for using disbursement payments to prop up firm
A compliance officer for finance and administration who helped the firm’s owner use £500,000 received for disbursements to prop up the firm has accepted a ban from the profession.
Law firm’s head of BD jailed over indecent images
The former head of business development at a leading defendant law firm has been jailed for four years after a police raid discovered 6,000 indecent images of children on his computer and other devices.
Gowland joins LSB in chartered legal executive first
A former president of the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives has become the first member of that branch of the profession to be appointed to the Legal Services Board.
Call for impartial websites on quality of lawyers’ services
Independent websites providing impartial information on the quality of legal services providers are needed to guide people looking for a lawyer, the Legal Services Consumer Panel has argued.
Blog
The questions that determine if the SRA’s client money reforms will work
Both reforms respond to real and well-evidenced gaps in the current framework. The SRA’s changes after consultation feedback shows it’s listening. But structural change on paper is only half the job.
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.
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