Compliance & Regulation

A solicitor who stole cash from a vulnerable client using her debit card while acting under a lasting power of attorney has been struck off.

A solicitor who misled a vulnerable family law client into sending explicit photographs of herself to his personal mobile phone has been struck off.

The number of complaints received by law firms went up by about a fifth between 2019 and 2023, the SRA has found – but averages out only at four per practice.

Efforts by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to speed up investigations are falling short of some of the targets introduced last year, it has emerged.

Members of the BSB clashed with senior staff last week over how to deal with the large number of foreign lawyers seeking to be called in England and Wales but who do not intend to practise here.

A law firm in Nottingham that failed to perform undertakings it gave on two property transactions – allowing another party to register a charge on one of them – has been fined £12,400.

The SRA has proposed a 336% hike in compensation fund contributions for law firms in the wake of the spiralling cost of law firm failures.

A senior law firm staff member who used her late mother’s disabled badge to park in a disabled bay close to its offices has been placed under controls imposed by the SRA.

A barrister who failed to comply with a court order to pay £54,600 to a former salaried partner in his law firm has been suspended for six months by a Bar disciplinary tribunal.

Lawyers and claims management companies making volume complaints to the Financial Ombudsman Service on behalf of clients will be charged £250 per case, it has proposed.

The Court of Appeal has rejected former solicitor Sophie Khan’s bid to overturn a contempt of court ruling sought by the SRA that will see her head to jail for a second time.

The director of communications, policy and research at the Electoral Commission is to become the new chief executive of the Legal Services Board.

The cost of regulation would “drop like a stone” if solicitors were not allowed to hold client money, the chief executive of the Solicitors Regulation Authority said yesterday.

The SSB Victims Support Group has expressed concern about the way the Solicitors Regulation Authority is conducting its investigation into the collapsed Sheffield law firm.

Litigation funding supports the public interest and access to justice but will remain niche in aiding consumers, according to major research which identified 44 cases in the last five years.