Compliance & Regulation

The closure of 16 offices of the Metamorph Group by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has so far cost the profession £1.4m, it has emerged.

Lawyers and others face a future in which criminals can use artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT to enhance their ability to commit fraud, Europol has warned.

The Legal Services Board has firmly rebuffed suggestions that it is guilty of ‘overreach’ in doing more than just overseeing the performance of the frontline regulators.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority is introducing tougher targets for its investigators in a bid to reduce delays in processing complaints about solicitors.

The Bar Standards Board said last night that it was assessing self-reports from barristers who say they will defy the cab-rank rule – but experts predict it will not take action until they do.

Two non-lawyers who between them misappropriated £1m from their respective law firms’ bank accounts have been banned from working in the profession.

An immigration solicitor secretly recorded by the BBC advising an undercover journalist how to obtain “fraudulent” evidence for a visa application has been struck off.

The cost of practising as a solicitor looks set to increase significantly this year after the SRA warned yesterday that it would be seeking more funding from the profession.

It is “five years too late” for regulators in the UK to provide “any meaningful response” to the challenges raised by AI, the chief executive of the Legal Services Board said yesterday.

There is “a group of clients who should not be represented by lawyers” and the profession should be discussing where to draw the line, a leading anti-corruption campaigner has argued.

The ‘Declaration of Conscience’ that has sparked a heated debate on the need for the cab-rank rule is just a “magician’s trick” and “a performative, protest document”, the chair of the CBA has said.

The public argument over the cab-rank rule looks set to rumble on after the Bar Council chair ratcheted up his criticism of barristers refusing to act against eco-causes.

A row about the cab-rank rule blew up today after barristers who have committed not to prosecute climate protestors or work for fossil fuel companies self-reported themselves to the BSB.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority does not appear to recognise the “severity of the risks” facing in-house lawyers indicated by its own research, a group of senior practitioners has warned.

An “inflationary” 9.6% increase in the Legal Ombudsman’s budget for 2023-24, to £16.8m, has been approved by the Legal Services Board.