Barristers

A barrister has set up a limited company, regulated by the Bar Standards Board, to work as a consultant for a leading City law firm. Jane Walshe said she was the first barrister to be authorised to work in this way.

Male solicitors must be alert to their “unconscious assumptions” and ensure female barristers get an “equal crack of the whip in winning work on their merits”, the vice-chair of the Bar Standards Board has said. Patricia Robertson QC also said it was essential for women barristers to “find the right life partner”.

Plans by the Bar Standards Board to scrap its ‘list of defaulting solicitors’ have been approved by the Legal Services Board. Richard Moriarty, chief executive of the LSB, said the list could undermine the independence of the BSB.

An innovative Hereford-based alternative business structure has set up a joint venture with a Welsh accountancy firm, joining nine other branded businesses in the Kidwell Group, ranging from a barristers’ chambers to a guest house.

The Bar Standards Board (BSB) is seeking the power to impose fines of up to £1,000 on barristers cleared by disciplinary tribunals, it has emerged. It also wants greater scope to appeal to the High Court.

A former solicitor and barrister have both been convicted and sentenced by magistrates for the providing unregulated immigration advice and services. They are the latest in a string of convictions for this offence.

Damian McCarthy, a barrister whose disbarment was overturned by the Court of Appeal, has said he is hoping for a “fair hearing” from a new Bar disciplinary tribunal. The Bar Standards Board said it remained of the view that he had acted dishonestly.

A long-running disciplinary case involving accusations that a barrister forged client care letters must be heard again, the Visitors to the Inns of Court have ruled. They said there was “no basis” for saying that the barrister would be deprived of a fair hearing “by reason of delay and/or any prior knowledge” of BSB witnesses.

The Bar Standards Board is investigating 17 barristers at the same chambers over complaints about a ‘failure to act appropriately towards pupils’, it has emerged. Its annual enforcement report also showed that nine investigations were started into barristers with drink-driving convictions in 2014/15.

The Bar Standards Board (BSB), which predicted at one point last year that it would authorise 400 firms in 2015, has authorised only 32 in its first four months as an entity regulator, it has emerged. Meanwhile it may not be regulating alternative business structures until later next year.

The removal of regulatory restrictions on in-house lawyers could provide greater access to justice for consumers, the Legal Services Board has said. It also warned the Solicitors Regulation Authority and Bar Standards Board that the reviews of the rules for in-house lawyers they are starting “will need to be far reaching”.

Alistair MacDonald QC, chairman of the Bar Council, has called for a revolution in the training of barristers to cut what he described as “astronomical” costs and increase the chances of successful students getting a pupillage. He also raised questions about the non-lawyer ownership of law firms.

Barristers’ call for a review of the standards of solicitor-advocates’ work in family cases has been received coolly by regulators, who have told Legal Futures they have seen no evidence of the kinds of problems that would justify an investigation.

The Bar Standards Board is to dispense with its ‘list of defaulting solicitors’ and replace it with a new rule allowing barristers to refuse work under the cab-rank rule where there is an “unacceptable risk” that they will not get paid.

A Bar Council report on the working lives of women barristers has revealed more clearly than ever the shocking sexism that some of them have faced during their careers, particularly while pupils. Women also complained of being forced to specialise in family and sex crime cases.