Willetts: Lack of transparency
Misconduct reports about solicitors have risen 27% in the past year – and 58% over two years – the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has revealed.
It has also told solicitors to whom it outsources the early assessment of reports that they must stop describing themselves as SRA investigation officers, after well-known regulatory solicitor-advocate Jayne Willetts raised what she dubbed its “outsourcing ruse”.
In the six months to 30 April, the SRA reviewed 8,955 new reports about potential misconduct – an average of 1,493 a month – compared to 7,034 in the same period in 2024-25 and 5,654 the year before.
However, this did not translate into more investigations – 1,322 reports were escalated for formal investigation by the assessment and early resolution team in the last six months.
This compares with 1,479 in 2024-25 but is a lot more than the 937 in 2023-24.
In total, as of 30 April, the SRA was handling ongoing investigations linked to 1,844 reports of potential misconduct – again, lower than at this point last year but markedly higher than two years ago.
The figures aim to support the SRA’s bid for a 29%, or £25m, increase [1] in its funding for the 2026-27 practising year.
Jonathan Peddie, executive director for investigations, enforcement and litigation, said: “We’ve seen an unprecedented increase in the reports we receive, putting significant pressure on our approach and resources.
“In the short term, we have diverted resources from elsewhere, but this isn’t sustainable as we need strength in all areas.
“As outlined in our recently published draft business plan, we need to consider a range of fundamental changes to the way we work in response to this changing dynamic.”
Ms Willetts, who is a sole practitioner in the West Midlands, explained that the SRA was outsourcing the early assessment of reports to external law firms but recipients of letters from them would not know this.
According to the SRA, three of its intervention panel firms have provided around 50 staff to help with the assessment process.
She said: “The letter is produced on SRA letterheading, signed off by a named individual described as ‘Investigation Officer Solicitors Regulation Authority’. There is even an SRA email address under the signature block.
“To add more deception the second paragraph of each SRA letter contains the following statement: ‘I am an Investigation Officer at the SRA.’”
Ms Willetts suggested it was being done because solicitors “would refuse to co-operate with the investigation” if they knew it was an external firm they were dealing with.
“Apart from the lack of transparency, which is bad enough… the principal reason for concern about this concealed arrangement relates to client confidentiality,” she went on.
Solicitors were “routinely asked” for information about their clients as part of the assessment and she said “it is not accepted that a third-party law firm is entitled to obtain confidential information in this way”.
The High Court is set to consider [2] whether the SRA itself has the power it claims to examine legally privileged material as part of investigations.
Ms Willetts said there were also risks of potential disclosure of confidential information about the law firm and of both client and commercial conflicts of interest.
“Even if conflict checks are undertaken by the external firm, the same courtesy Is not afforded to the recipient of the letter. Conflicts checks are relevant to both sides in these situations.
“Those under investigation need to have the opportunity to check for conflicts before being investigated by an external firm.”
Ms Willetts said she was not questioning the SRA’s ability to outsource work but its transparency in doing so, and was speaking out after failing to receive a satisfactory answer after raising the issue directly.
An SRA spokesman said: “The work outsourced is to assess complaints against our criteria to see if they warrant further investigation – only if that is the case would the subjects of the complaints be considered ‘under investigation’, and any investigation would only be undertaken by SRA staff.
“Those contracted have been done so through the same procurement process that other work would use, including addressing risks like conflict and confidentiality. They are effectively in-house staff, carrying out the work using SRA systems
“However, we have acknowledged Ms Willetts’ point that they are not investigation officers and they now say they are working on our behalf instead.”
In response, Ms Willetts said she was “reassured” that the SRA would now disclose that the work was outsourced, but less so by “the SRA’s attempt to draw a distinction between this work and those being ‘under investigation’”.
She explained: “It matters not for these purposes as the external providers are still requesting detailed confidential information both client and commercial in order to assess the complaints.
“It is also disappointing that the SRA fails to recognise that those receiving these letters should be entitled to check for conflict and confidentiality risks in just the same way as the external providers. It is not a unilateral process. Hopefully, we will hear more from the SRA as it reviews its procedures.”