Legal Services Board

More than half of all legal providers are failing to meet requirements to provide clients with clear information on their complaints procedure – according to research from the Legal Services Board – which also shows that almost 70% of complaints against lawyers are upheld.

The Law Society has launched what appears to be a last-ditch bid to persuade the Legal Services Board to scrap the proposed scheme to assess the quality of criminal advocacy, saying there is no evidence to support the assertion that standards have fallen.

The Legal Services Board is to be slimmed down, and variable length terms introduced, after most of its members were reappointed. Chairman David Edmonds said he believed “we can operate at the same high level with a smaller board”.

Legal Services Board chairman David Edmonds is wrong to say there is a “disconnect” between legal education and legal practice, it was claimed last week by the man who has systematically reviewed the Bar’s education and training regime.

It is highly unlikely that the Solicitors Regulation Authority will be able to license alternative business structures on 6 October, Legal Futures can reveal. Legal Services Board chief executive Chris Kenny has admitted to us that getting the required orders through Parliament in time is looking “not impossible but very difficult”.

There should be no general ban on referral fees, but individual frontline regulators are free to impose one for their part of the legal market if they can justify it, the Legal Services Board has concluded. It said transparency needs improving but there is little evidence of “actual or potential harm”.

Lesbian, gay and bisexual lawyers and staff could be inadvertently “outed” as a result of the Legal Services Board’s plans to increase diversity in the workplace, leading campaign group Stonewall has warned. The charity strongly supported monitoring the sexual orientation of staff but said the board needs to find another way of doing it.

The role of price comparison and customer review websites are set to come under scrutiny from the Legal Services Board as part of efforts to help consumers judge the technical quality of the legal advice they receive. It will also consider whether a “badge” would distinguish regulated and non-regulated providers.

The Legal Services Board yesterday approved the Council for Licensed Conveyancers’ application to become the first licensing authority for alternative business structures, despite the opposition of the Lord Chief Justice.

The Legal Services Board is considering whether to consolidate the disciplinary regimes run by all the different legal regulators, it has emerged. Recent events “suggest we should explore the feasibility of rationalising existing mechanisms sooner rather than later”.