Other lawyers

The Legal Services Board has strongly criticised the Solicitors Regulation Authority over failures in its enforcement work and IT systems – and also warned about the risk that the overhaul of the Handbook “may be too much” for firms and the regulator to cope with. However, the LSB said the legal regulators collectively had all made “substantial progress”.

The Council for Licensed Conveyancers (CLC) is planning to introduce solicitor-style indemnity insurance arrangements, in a bid to make it easier for law firms to switch regulator. Embracing an open market scheme instead of a master policy would help “make a reality” of the “theoretical” freedom of law firms to change.

Conveyancers may need to be placed under extra duties of care so as to reduce the risk of fraudulent changes being made to the Land Register, the Law Commission has suggested. A major review of the Land Registration Act 2002 also put forward ways the law could encourage the development of electronic conveyancing.

The battle for the future of legal regulation is set to move into high gear next week with publication of the government consultation on making regulators such as the Solicitors Regulation Authority and Bar Standards Board fully independent of the representative bodies which technically oversee them.

Plans to create three new breeds of lawyer – probate practitioners, conveyancing technicians and probate technicians – are being published today by the Council for Licensed Conveyancers. Issuing its annual report for 2015 and business plan for 2016, the CLC said it is also to review its rule book in a bid to aid innovation in the market.

Almost half of asylum seekers are not satisfied with the service provided by their lawyers, a report for the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Legal Ombudsman has found. It exposed how some firms paid interpreters to recruit asylum seeker clients at ports and detention centres.

The government should return regulation to the legal profession’s representative bodies, rather than introduce full separation, the Law Society has said in response to yesterday’s surprise announcement from the Treasury that separation is now on the cards. The move is set to open up the fault lines in the current regulatory set-up created by the 2007 Legal Services Act.

Real separation of representative and regulatory functions at organisations like the Law Society and Bar Council is “unfinished business” of the Legal Services Act, according to the woman who led the society’s negotiations with the government in the run-up to the Act.

Only 13% of small businesses believe lawyers “provide a cost-effective means to resolve legal issues”, the biggest survey of its kind has found. The survey also found that small businesses were more likely to use accountants in solving legal problems than solicitors.

The Claims Management Regulator has handed out its biggest fine to date – £570,000 – and raided the offices of three other claims management companies as it tries to crack down on bad practices in the sector.

Regulation accounts for between 15% and 23% of the costs of law firms, money they would generally not bother spending if they were not required to, an indicative study by the Legal Services Board has found. However, the opposite was the case for lawyers practising as individuals.

Legal apprenticeships funded by the government are on course to start next September, the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Chartered Institute of Legal Executives and the Council for Licensed Conveyancers have confirmed.

A ‘professional’ McKenzie Friend who targeted people unable to claim legal aid and then defrauded them of thousands of pounds has been jailed for three years. He offered cheap legal services to people involved in cases involving their children or grandchildren.

A Birmingham man who provided unregulated immigration advice has become the latest operator in the sector to be convicted for his actions. He was sentenced to a community order for 24 weeks, concurrent for each offence, and made subject to a curfew.

Legal regulators have called on the government to make a series of changes to the Legal Services Act that will make it easier to approve and regulate alternative business structures. The move is part of the first output from joint work being done by all of the legal regulators to identify opportunities for deregulation.