Hayhoe: Efficiency must not be conflated with minimalism
The Legal Services Consumer Panel (LSCP) has questioned whether the Legal Services Board (LSB) is “sufficiently resourced and structured” to oversee regulation of the sector.
Tom Hayhoe, chair of the LSCP – which is an independent arm of the board – also cast doubt on the LSB’s use of policy statements as its “primary mechanism for driving regulatory change” given the “mixed evidence of their effectiveness”.
The panel’s view on the size of the LSB is likely to place it at odds with the frontline regulators.
Mr Hayhoe said: “The legal services market is increasingly complex, technologically dynamic, and characterised by rapid shifts in business models and risk profiles.
“It is reasonable to ask whether an oversight regulator of less than 50 staff is sufficiently resourced and structured to oversee such a system effectively.
“This is not a criticism of the LSB’s staff or leadership, but a recognition that the scale and complexity of the sector may now exceed the assumptions underpinning the LSB’s original design.”
He went on: “Efficiency must not be conflated with minimalism. A regulator can be lean without being powered.
“The panel therefore encourages the LSB to undertake a strategic review of its own organisational capability, assessing whether its current structure, resourcing, and skill mix are aligned with the demands of a sector that is both expanding and becoming more complex.”
The LSCP was responding to a consultation on the LSB’s draft business plan for 2026/27, launched in January. This proposed a budget for the LSB of under £5.7m, a 0.5% reduction on the current year.
Mr Hayhoe said the panel was “not convinced that the budget, as presented, fully reflects the scale of the task the LSB has set itself”.
The LSCP would welcome “a clearer narrative that links the budget to the LSB’s statutory objectives and to the heightened expectations placed upon it.
“If the LSB concludes that its current budget is insufficient to discharge its role effectively, it should say so candidly and make the case for the resources it needs.”
The LSB issues policy statements which set the framework for and expectations on the frontline regulators to act on specific topics; it is currently consulting on one to encourage greater diversity, equality and inclusion in the profession, for example.
Mr Hayhoe pointed to the policy statement on empowering consumers, which he said “has not delivered the step change in transparency, comparability, or consumer understanding that the sector urgently requires”.
Since the LSB had “a broad armory of regulatory tools at its disposal”, it was unclear why it focused on policy statements.
Mr Hayhoe said the LSB’s own research with the LSCP on regulatory leadership in access to justice had “identified a wide range of practical levers available to regulators”, yet none of them “appear to be reflected” in the business plan.
The panel was also concerned that the LSB “appears to be relying heavily on technology and AI [artificial intelligence] as the primary mechanism for addressing access to justice gaps”.
A strategy that placed “disproportionate weight on technology” risked overlooking the “systemic reforms required to make legal services genuinely accessible”.
The panel urged the LSB to “take a more substantive and visible role” in relation to access to justice as well.
“While the LSB may not have direct locus to intervene in social policy decisions that restrict access to justice, such as legal aid cuts or the withdrawal of public funding, it does have a statutory objective to promote access to justice and a duty, as an independent regulator, to highlight where that objective is being undermined.
“The panel believes the LSB should use its voice more assertively to illuminate the growing gap between legal need and legal provision.”
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