Compliance & Regulation

The number of complaints about claims management companies continues to fall, the Financial Ombudsman Service says as it consider charging professional representatives to make one.

The government has today approved the increase in the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s fining power, from £2,000 to £25,000, despite opposition from the profession.

A non-practising barrister who wrote “bullying and aggressive” emails to a group supporting people with autoinflammatory conditions has been reprimanded by a disciplinary tribunal.

A law firm in Telford whose multiple failures raised the risk of it facilitating money laundering and terrorist financing has been fined by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

A solicitor who failed to supervise an immigration caseworker in a matter which led the High Court to refer his firm to the Solicitors Regulation Authority has been rebuked.

The Green Party has called for disciplinary action against solicitor and barrister MPs who vote for legislation which disregards the rule of law.

The traditional partnership is now the least popular form of law firm structure, while alternative business structures now make up more than 10% of all practices, new figures have shown.

The Bar Standards Board would be “ill advised” to take disciplinary action against barristers who take part in the strike action over legal aid rates, as dozens of QCs complain about the Lord Chief Justice.

The Bar Standards Board has told striking barristers that it will focus in particular on any harm caused, following the Lord Chief Justice’s warning that their actions may amount to misconduct

The Solicitors Regulation Authority is set to make it easier for law firm staff to blow the whistle on their employers, as part of its work on SLAPPs – of which it is investigating more than 20.

The whole profession needs to address “out of control” legal costs, a major new report has concluded, but costs lawyers have a significant role to play in exerting downward pressure on them.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has reported £161m worth of suspect transactions involving the profession to the National Crime Agency, with failures to check the source of funds the main trigger.

The founders of a specialist family law firm have spurned potential acquirors to transfer it instead into an employee ownership trust, saying the move sends a positive signal to would-be staff.

A solicitor who let one mistake on a property sale snowball so that it affected multiple transactions in a portfolio has been fined £10,000 – even though he preferred to be struck off.

A solicitor who used a disabled badge that did not belong to him nine times to park near his law firm has failed in his appeal against being struck off.