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A very senior criminal law QC has been suspended for a year over a decision not to disclose surveillance evidence which ultimately led to a conviction being overturned on appeal.

Conveyancers enjoyed their busiest year on record in 2021/22 – and hundreds of law firms came back into the market – with the average practice seeing a 60% rise in transactions.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has been hit by a wave of complaints relating to its closure of law firm consolidator Kingly Solicitors in the summer of 2020.

The disciplinary tribunals for solicitors and barristers have agreed to impose “deterrent” sanctions for sexual and racial misconduct and other forms of discrimination, bullying or harassment.

The explosion in cyber-attacks is pushing insurance to the limits of affordability for some, with the professional services sector the biggest target of ransomware.

Fast-track and multi-track civil cases are taking between five and 15 months to complete their first case and costs management conference, depending on the court, research has found.

The International Bar Association has launched a project to examine the role of lawyers as “ethical gatekeepers” within wider society and help clarify their ethical responsibilities at work.

The plan by HM Courts & Tribunals to make the new damages claim portal compulsory for defendants from 2 June was pulled at the last minute for unknown reasons.

Email-based fraud is on the rise and is the dominant method criminals use to access law firms’ systems, with ransomware was also increasing and evolving, according to the SRA.

A Court of Appeal judge has deprecated litigators who display their “machismo” but found that a party’s approach to enforce a non-compete covenant went “too far in the opposite direction”.