Compliance & Regulation

The government has begun recruiting the fourth chair of the Legal Services Board, with the Lord Chancellor saying they would play a key role in “reshaping legal services”.

A solicitor who amended a deed of trust to remove a beneficial interest has been rebuked for doing so without checking that the beneficiary had consented.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has a “long way to go” to improve the diversity of its senior management, it said as it published its ethnicity pay gap for the first time.

The Legal Services Board this week approved projects to improve the way regulators approach financial protection for consumers, as well as discipline and enforcement.

The Legal Services Board has told the government that “there is a strong case for legislating” to ensure legal regulators have the powers to stop lawyers breaking sanctions imposed by the UK.

Legal regulators need to do more to deal with SLAPPs – strategic lawsuits against public participation – because they are undermining the profession’s reputation, a report has argued.

A veteran barrister has been fined £4,250 by a Bar disciplinary tribunal for carrying out litigation without authorisation and handling client money on behalf of a direct access client.

Firms of licensed conveyancers will have to apply for professional indemnity insurance two months ahead of the renewal deadline and in return will receive a response within four weeks.

Legal regulation is not protecting consumers from harm – both in their inability to access services and when things go wrong – meaning structural reform is more urgent than ever.

Two managers of a collapsed personal injury law firm have each been fined £18,000 for failing to declare commissions earned by a connected business which provided clients with ATE insurance.

Details of the disciplinary case the Solicitors Regulation Authority will make against Sophie Khan – who was jailed for contempt after failing to give it her firm’s papers – were published yesterday.

A solicitor specialising in actions against the police who failed to disclose the existence of a warrant to counsel and the court has been struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

The High Court has rejected an appeal from a barrister disbarred after a council tax conviction and submission of dishonest evidence to a Crown Court.

The decision by the Financial Conduct Authority to exclude in-house lawyers from its senior managers and certification regime has damaged the authority they have in their organisations.

The Legal Services Board has said it expects to see “a sense of pace and urgency” from regulators in improving the flow of information to consumers to help them choose a lawyer.