Legal Services Board

There should be no general ban on referral fees, but individual frontline regulators are free to impose one for their part of the legal market if they can justify it, the Legal Services Board has concluded. It said transparency needs improving but there is little evidence of “actual or potential harm”.

Lesbian, gay and bisexual lawyers and staff could be inadvertently “outed” as a result of the Legal Services Board’s plans to increase diversity in the workplace, leading campaign group Stonewall has warned. The charity strongly supported monitoring the sexual orientation of staff but said the board needs to find another way of doing it.

The role of price comparison and customer review websites are set to come under scrutiny from the Legal Services Board as part of efforts to help consumers judge the technical quality of the legal advice they receive. It will also consider whether a “badge” would distinguish regulated and non-regulated providers.

The Legal Services Board yesterday approved the Council for Licensed Conveyancers’ application to become the first licensing authority for alternative business structures, despite the opposition of the Lord Chief Justice.

The Legal Services Board is considering whether to consolidate the disciplinary regimes run by all the different legal regulators, it has emerged. Recent events “suggest we should explore the feasibility of rationalising existing mechanisms sooner rather than later”.

City firm Hogan Lovells and 39 Essex Street chambers have retained their roles as general legal advisers to the Legal Services Board. The pair, as well as five specialist providers, have been reappointed following an internal review on their existing terms and rates until 31 March 2012.

Advocates seeking accreditation under the quality assurance for advocates (QAA) scheme will be allowed to opt for an assessment centre route rather than judges’ evaluations alone, under new proposals being debated today.

The Legal Services Board has an “absolute right” to intervene whenever it believes frontline regulators are dragging their heels, such as acting to improve diversity, the Legal Services Board chairman, David Edmonds, told the Legal Futures conference.

Doubts over whether alternative business structures (ABSs) will start on 6 October persist after justice minister Jonathan Djanogly today refused to confirm that they will happen on that day. “Quality is paramount and I will not shortcut a complicated process involving no less than a dozen parliamentary orders,” he said.

The legal regulatory system is “defective” and in time it might be right for a single regulator to replace the eight frontline regulators, the chairman of the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Charles Plant, told yesterday’s Legal Futures Conference.

The battle over whether the Legal Services Board, its consumer panel and the Legal Ombudsman can retain their own websites continues, with the sites not closing at the end of last month as the Ministry of Justice had originally instructed.

The Legal Services Board is to launch an assessment of the regulation of immigration advice and services after taking over responsibility for overseeing frontline regulators in the field. The move will save the profession £110,000 in direct costs.

David Edmonds was today reappointed as chairman of Legal Services Board for a second three-year term. Mr Edmonds, who is paid £63,000 a year for a minimum of 70 days’ work, will now be in post until 30 April 2014.

The Lord Chief Justice has spoken out against licensed conveyancers being granted rights to conduct litigation and advocacy. Lord Judge said they are areas of work which lie outside the proper sphere of activity of a licensed conveyancer and he could see no strong public interest in giving them those rights.

The Legal Services Board (LSB) has shown a lack of understanding and judgement, and an unwillingness to listen to the approved regulators, the Bar Council has claimed. The Bar Council also expressed surprise at plans to increase LSB staff costs at a time of public sector cuts – saying it should take a “Big Society” approach to its work – and also questioned whether the board is overextending its remit.