Legal Executives

The Bar Standards Board has become the first frontline regulator to map out how it will take forward the Legal Education & Training Review (LETR). Earlier this week the BSB and Solicitors Regulation Authority were criticised for not collaborating on taking forward the LETR.

The High Court has capped the costs exposure of the four barristers bringing a judicial review against the Legal Services Board over the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates – but at a level 10 times the one they had proposed.

The frontline regulators need lay chairs at the helm so as to cut the “overly strong ties” that still exist with their branches of the profession and have held back change, the Legal Services Board said yesterday. The call was met by strong opposition.

Criminal barristers were yesterday given permission to pursue their judicial review against the Legal Services Board over the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA). The legal challenge is that QASA “offends fundamental issues of justice”.

The legal director of the Legal Services Board disagreed with its decision to approve the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates because he wanted to ensure that the impact on judicial independence had been fully considered, it has emerged.

The Legal Services Board is to issue statute-backed guidelines to compel legal regulators to follow its vision of how reforms resulting from the Legal Education and Training Review should be implemented.

The Bar Standards Board has pledged to continue with preparations for the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates notwithstanding the judicial review against the scheme launched last week. Meanwhile, it has been criticised for its “mean” position over the costs of the JR.

The Law Society’s bid to regain responsibility for much of the regulation of solicitors has “inadvertently” made the case for completely independent regulation, a leading figure at the Solicitors Regulation Authority has claimed.

A long-awaited judicial review of the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) has been launched by criminal law barristers against the Legal Services Board (LSB).

There is “sufficient consistency of evidence and concern” about the standard of criminal advocacy to warrant the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA), the Legal Services Board concluded today.

There is a good standard of legal education and training in England and Wales – “for the most part” – but quality, accessibility and flexibility need to be enhanced “to ensure the system remains fit for the future”, the Legal Education and Training Review research report has concluded.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has pledged to undertake a “radical review of the skills and knowledge required to merit qualification as a solicitor” as part of its response to the findings of the Legal Education and Training Review research report, which was published today.

The prospect of barristers boycotting the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates became almost certain on Saturday after all but one of more than 1,000 members of the South Eastern Circuit said they would refuse to sign up to it.

Criticism of the government’s decision not to regulate will-writing continued yesterday – although the two bodies representing the will-writing community appeared at odd over the prospects of self-regulation succeeding.

A last-minute Law Society bid to delay the controversial Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) until after the government’s consultation on price competitive tendering for criminal work was yesterday rejected by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.