Barristers

The Bar Standards Board chair’s description of opponents of the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates as “a noisy minority of dissenters” received an immediate high-powered response from criminal law barristers.

Criminal barristers’ steadfast objection to the inclusion of plea-only advocates in the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates will be viewed by the public as self-interest, the vice-chair of the Bar Standards Board has warned.

The Law Society and Bar Council have called a truce over the Bar’s new standard terms of business and agreed to talk through their differences – some five years after leaving the negotiating table.

All legal services providers should undertake and publish equal pay audits, the Legal Services Board (LSB) has suggested – this would ideally be voluntary, “but only if it results in the changes needed”. It came in an LSB review of the evidence on equal pay.

Barristers should soon be free to give their personal opinions on cases when the rule restricting them to voicing only clients’ views is finally lifted – four years after the change was first mooted. Their regulator said lifting the same ban on solicitors had not caused a problem.

The Bar Standards Board has become the latest regulator facing questions over race discrimination in its disciplinary system after an internal report appeared to show the existence of racial bias.

Three barristers have so far said they will appeal against disciplinary decisions affected by the failure of the Council of the Inns of Court to administer the Bar’s tribunal system properly, with the Bar Standards Board not resisting two of them, it has emerged.

The meeting of heads of chambers on the South Eastern Circuit last week ended in unanimous opposition to the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) in its current form, it has emerged.

The City of London Law Society and Commercial Bar Association have published model terms of business for barristers instructed in commercial cases after more than two years of negotiation. The Bar Council’s new standard terms were deemed unacceptable by some solicitors.

The Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) will start in September, nine months later than planned, it was announced yesterday. The revised timetable was released just hours before heads of chambers met to discuss their response to QASA.

Barristers could end up uninsured and in financial hardship if they agree to variations of their new standard terms of contract recommended by the Law Society, the Bar Council has warned. It said it was “surprised and disappointed” at the tone of Chancery Lane’s practice note.

The Bar Standards Board’s plans to strengthen public access training for newly qualified barristers in client care are inadequate and should include extensive supervision to ensure competence as is required of trainee solicitors, according to the Law Society.

The Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates is illogical in its treatment of QCs and does not serve the public interest by allowing solicitors to act as plea-only advocates, the chairman of the Bar Council has argued. The claims come as the bodies representing criminal law solicitors and barristers united in calling for a halt to the scheme.

Legal regulators have failed to open up their professional registers containing disciplinary information to price comparison websites, despite having been instructed to do so by the Legal Services Board, the Legal Services Consumer Panel has complained.

The Law Society has urged solicitors to protect themselves against the new terms of business being introduced by the Bar next week because they are “weighted strongly” in favour of barristers. From 31 January the traditional default system of non-contractual terms will be replaced.