Solicitors

The profession’s regulators are not doing enough to understand the consumers of lawyers’ services, the Legal Services Board has warned. But it said there has been progress since the first assessment in 2012/13.

All the legal services regulators should under a new duty to “have regard to the desirability of promoting economic growth”, the Solicitors Regulation Authority has said. They should also appoint small business champions.

The Court of Appeal has overturned a High Court decision that a Sussex law firm wrongly paid out £2.28m it had received from a group of investors in what turned out to be a doomed airport investment scheme.

Regulators need to do more with the diversity data they now collect in order to drive improvements in recruitment and particularly progression and retention within the profession, the Legal Services Board will shortly say.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has apologised for releasing information that made it appear as if there had been a massive rise in training places last year – when in fact the number has stayed static.

The Legal Services Consumer Panel has given “qualified support” to plans by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to rewrite the separate business rule. The panel said the existing rule had “fallen into disrepute”.

Plans by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to relax the separate business rule could cause “irreparable damage” to the solicitor brand and “drive significant numbers of the profession” into the unregulated sector, the City of London Law Society has warned.

The barristers challenging the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates have today been granted permission to appeal to the Supreme Court. The hearing is listed for March.

The Legal Services Board has given its blessing to the end of the “arbitrary” hours-based continuous professional development scheme for solicitors.

The High Court has backed an application by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to destroy millions of documents seized from firms it has intervened in and had to store since, at significant cost to the profession.

Giving reporting accountants more responsibility in identifying risks to client money will encourage law firms to play the “blame game”, the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has warned.

A solicitor convicted of assisting unlawful immigration into a European Union member state this week lost his appeal against conviction, shortly after being struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.

The big City firms believe they are “way ahead” of the Law Society on diversity and inclusion, a report for the society has found. But the only LBGT network that had supported the victim of a homophobic comment was at a large City firm.

The jailing of former Law Society council member Michael Webster for a fraud offence last summer caused “significant damage” to the profession, the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has said.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has warned of confidentiality risks from law firm mergers and acquisitions. It also highlighted dangers arising from cloud computing and complex global business structures.