Compliance & Regulation
Fine for solicitor who used client account as personal banking facility
A solicitor who used his firm’s client account as a personal banking facility did not need to admit that he had damaged public trust, the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has held.
Mayson: Lawyers must prioritise public interest over clients
Lawyers seem to have forgotten that the public interest trumps the client interest and this needs to change, Professor Stephen Mayson has argued.
Barrister disbarred for making ‘fundamentally dishonest’ PI claim
A barrister who a court found had been fundamentally dishonest in making a personal injury claim has been disbarred.
SRA lays out major reforms to how solicitors hold client money
Major changes to the way law firms hold client money, including not retaining interest and restricting the collection of fees in advance, were proposed yesterday by the SRA.
“Reasons to be cautious” about pre-approval of law firm M&A
There are “reasons to be cautious” around the Solicitors Regulation Authority becoming more involved when law firms go through mergers and acquisitions, it said yesterday.
SRA set to shift balance of who pays for compensation fund
The 50/50 split between individual solicitors and firms in their funding of the SRA Compensation Fund should be changed to 70/30, the regulator has recommended.
Moorhead: “We have to change the way lawyers think and behave”
The leading figure on legal ethics in the UK has called for the creation of an independent commission charged with improving “honesty, integrity and effectiveness in the use of law”.
Barrister who held and dipped into client money suspended
A direct access barrister who impermissibly held a divorce client’s money and then did not pay all of it back has been suspended for 18 months by a disciplinary tribunal.
Barristers “wrongly think they work within AML regulations”
Barristers are wrongly stating that their work is covered by the money laundering regulations in their annual declarations to the Bar Standards Board, it has emerged.
Risk assessment failures land more firms with AML fines
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has issued fines totalling £57,000 to eight more law firms for failures in their anti-money laundering controls.
Blog
Recruitment, retention and reward in the legal accounts world
Understanding the legal finance market is important – not just for those actively involved in it day-to-day but also for leaders within law firms.
From ‘year zero’ to £6.5m – how a law firm found its second life
In 2018, I hit what I call ‘year zero’. On paper, Olliers Solicitors was a top-tier criminal defence firm but beneath the surface, I could see we were at a crossroads.
Linklaters’ chief growth officer takes the ‘blank sheet’ challenge
In the third and final part of this series, Lucy Murphy, chief growth officer at magic circle firm Linklaters, outlines her vision for the law firm of the future.
