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A greater focus on specialist sectors is seen by senior managers as the biggest opportunity for law firms over the next two to three years, a survey has found. It comes at a time when firms believe that competitive pressures have increased but almost all are confident about the future.

The government yesterday damped down hopes that it would consider funding greater access to early legal advice. Support for a restore legal aid for early advice has been growing, with justice committee chairman Bob Neill MP and Supreme Court president Baroness Hale among those to talk up its benefits.

The High Court has rejected one of the Bar Standards Board’s (BSB) first appeals against a disciplinary sanction, sharply criticising the way in which it was pursued. The court found that the BSB had “fallen far short” of showing that no reasonable tribunal could have decided to just reprimand high-profile barrister Lincoln Crawford.

Before-the-event legal expenses insurance has “a considerable role in improving access to justice in the current legal landscape”, with the advice helplines that come with them of particular benefit, a major report has found.

Gateley, the UK’s first listed law firm, has announced strong first-half results, with revenue up 9.8% to £38.6m. A significant proportion of the growth (15%) came from the two non-legal businesses it bought last year, surveyors Hamer Associates and tax advisory business Capitus.

The Land Registry has unveiled plans to use artificial intelligence in conveyancing and also publish data on conveyancers’ performance. It comes as a Legal Futures report – published today – highlights how the use of data is set to change commercial conveyancing and the law firms which do it.

A non-lawyer working at leading Welsh firm Hugh James who forged a document in the name of an assistant solicitor has been banned from working in the profession. Meanwhile, a senior partner at a large City law firm has accepted a rebuke after being convicted of drink driving.

Law firms advising on cross-border commerce should be “cautiously positive that Brexit and the election of Donald Trump as US president will not damage future global trade or the legal work that flows from it, according to a report. It said the long-term trend in trade and its regulation is not protectionism but rather continuing globalisation.

City giant Clifford Chance and partner Alexandros Panayides have agreed to pay fines of £50,000 each for conducting the infamous Excalibur case under an unlawful confidential fee agreement. The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has approved an ‘agreed outcome’ that means a full hearing will not be held.

The courts need to “move fast” to develop online dispute resolution and other forms of speedier dispute resolution, “before the millennials lose faith in the way the older generation is content to deliver justice”, the Chancellor of the High Court has warned. He also said that technology that aimed to forecast the outcome of disputes was “very useful”.