Solicitors

The regulators of solicitors and barristers have been accused of failing to collaborate closely enough on their responses to the Legal Education and Training Review, after they announced they would pursue independent strategies for ensuring competency.

The frontline regulators need lay chairs at the helm so as to cut the “overly strong ties” that still exist with their branches of the profession and have held back change, the Legal Services Board said yesterday. The call was met by strong opposition.

A total of 185 law firms have applied to the Solicitors Regulation Authority for the extended indemnity period of insurance, having failed to secure cover by 1 October – although 10 have already secured a policy.

Criminal barristers were yesterday given permission to pursue their judicial review against the Legal Services Board over the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA). The legal challenge is that QASA “offends fundamental issues of justice”.

Predictions of a professional indemnity insurance apocalypse appear to have been well wide of the mark, with just 69 firms so far notifying the Solicitors Regulation Authority that they have triggered the new extended indemnity period.

Solicitors and consumer representatives have come out on opposite sides of the Legal Ombudsman’s proposal to extend its remit to the estimated 130,000 unregulated legal services providers operating in England and Wales.

Barrister Paul Philip has been appointed as the next chief executive of the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Mr Philip is presently deputy chief executive and chief operating officer of the General Medical Council, and will join the SRA on 1 February 2014.

The legal director of the Legal Services Board disagreed with its decision to approve the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates because he wanted to ensure that the impact on judicial independence had been fully considered, it has emerged.

The country’s mortgage lenders have hit out at the Solicitors Regulation Authority for not being transparent in the way it runs its compensation fund, leading to a perception that lenders are being made to carry the can for solicitors’ wrongdoing.

Scottish conveyancers have voted against the introduction of separate representation for borrowers and lenders – having initially called for it. At an SGM of the Law Society of Scotland yesterday, 847 were against a rule change to the conflict of interest rules while 671 were in favour.

More than a year on from the deadline for law firms to nominate their compliance officers for legal practice and for finance and administration, and 40 practices still remain without anyone in place, the Solicitors Regulation Authority has revealed.

Misleading funders, inflating work-in-progress valuations and shortages in client account are among the common features of financially unstable firms that are currently under investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, it has emerged.

The chairman of the Legal Services Board has criticised the “continuing spats” between the Law Society and Solicitors Regulation Authority. David Edmonds also praised the improvements made by the SRA to the process for licensing alternative business structures.

The Legal Services Board is to issue statute-backed guidelines to compel legal regulators to follow its vision of how reforms resulting from the Legal Education and Training Review should be implemented.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority now has 1,200 law firms on its financial stability watchlist, with more likely to join it shortly, it has emerged. It follows the recent request for financial data from 2,000 practices.