SRA: Fewer SDT cases
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) issued 173 fines to law firms and individuals in its last financial year, more than twice the number of the previous year.
At the same time, the number of cases referred to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) fell, while interventions remained high.
The SRA is slow in releasing its performance statistics – it only released its annual reports for the year to 31 October 2023 in December 2024 – but has revealed some of what happened in 2023/24 in its newly published financial statement.
The maximum the SRA could fine traditional law firms or someone working in one went up in July 2022 from £2,000 to £25,000 (alternative business structures have a separate regime – £250m maximum fine for a firm and £50m for those working in them); it also introduced fixed penalties for certain administrative breaches of either £750 or £1,500.
In the year to 31 October 2024, the SRA issued 173 fines totalling £1.3m, compared to 73 in 2022/23 worth around £400,000 in all.
Of these, 73 were fixed penalties, 20 were for less than £2,000 and 80 for more.
A contributor to the first figure was a project begun in mid-2023 to ensure compliance with the transparency rules. To 31 October 2024, this has led to 35 fixed penalties and 577 letters of warning.
The current year will see at least the value of total fines rise, after the SRA handed out a record £4m fine to the former non-solicitor owner of collapsed law firm Kingly Solicitors, while there have also been some hefty fines for ABSs in breach of anti-money laundering rules – one we reported yesterday was for nearly £64,000.
In 2023/24, the SRA prosecuted 78 cases before the SDT, down from 99 in the previous year. This number has fluctuated from 76 to 112 over the last five years but the higher fining power is likely to contribute to a continuing decline, especially once the SRA activates the power for unlimited fines in cases of economic crime.
The SRA closed down 59 law firms, down from the recent record of 65 in 2022/23, in line with the “general increase in the number of interventions we are carrying out”.
Other information of interest in the financial statement included:
- There were 171,697 practising solicitors and 9,197 law firms (2023: 166,256 and 9,377, respectively) on 31 October, and more than 206,000 solicitors on the roll;
- 27% of new solicitors qualified through the Solicitors Qualifying Exam, up from 17% in 2022/23;
- The number of AML inspections and reviews doubled from 273 to 545;
- The Solicitors Register attracted 9.2m views, an increase of 42%; and
- The SRA had unrestricted reserves of £22.3m at the year-end, nearly £6m more than 12 months before.
In her introduction, SRA chair Anna Bradley said: “If trust and confidence is to be maintained, it is critical that the legal sector is backed by modern and fit-for-purpose regulation, and that we are an open, transparent, efficient and effective regulator. Good governance and financial management are central to that.”
Last month, the regulator said a “significant and sustained increase” in the number of reports about solicitor misconduct was behind its plans for an £11m increase in its budget to £168m.
Leave a Comment