Legal Services Act

South west law firm Stephens Scown is to become a pioneering alternative business structure at the end of his month, which will allow it to remain a partnership while introducing employee ownership. Managing partner Robert Camp he hoped it would provide a “way forward” for other law firms.

An alternative business structure to be launched by the Royal College of Nursing and Cardiff-based NewLaw next month is to limit its offering to personal injury, it has emerged, making it a markedly different offering from that set up last year by the British Medical Association.

One Legal – the alternative business structure originally set up in 2013 to work alongside the now-defunct Stobart Barristers – has shot back into the limelight by acquiring well-known criminal defence law firm Kaim Todner.

The Legal Services Board is set to instruct the frontline regulators like the Solicitors Regulation Authority and Bar Standards Board to get tough with lawyers who do not handle client complaints properly. Draft guidance published for consultation yesterday said that they could stage “supervisory interventions” into poorly performing firms.

A UK-based litigation funder is to back a shareholder class action against Slater & Gordon as its share price continues to tank following Monday’s announcement of huge losses. Having started the week at 83c, the embattled firm saw its shares finish trading on the Australian Stock Exchange today at just 26c, their lowest ever point.

Slater & Gordon is to conduct a major restructuring of its UK operation – with office closures and redundancies on the cards – after it unveiled an eye-watering loss of £493m for the six months ending 31 December 2015. The loss was mainly attributable to a write-down of goodwill arising from its acquisition of Quindell, but also underperformance of the entire UK operation.

The Ministry of Justice has given its strongest indication yet that, once the legal regulators become independent, lawyers will no longer be compelled to make a financial contribution to their representative bodies.

Cardiff firm NewLaw yesterday confirmed that it is working with the Royal College of Nursing to launch an alternative business structure from 1 April. The news came with its owner, AIM-listed Redde plc, announcing big rises in income and profits for the second half of 2015.

Slater & Gordon was yesterday granted a voluntary suspension of its shares on the Australian Stock Exchange following a period when their value has been increasing modestly. The request came ahead of the troubled law firm’s announcement of its financial results for the second half of 2015 next Monday.

The original contract lawyer business, Lawyers on Demand, is to merge with Australia’s AdventBalance in the first corss-continent merger of its type. The new business, to be called LOD from June, will still have Berwin Leighton Paisner – from which Lawyers on Demand sprang in 2007 – as a shareholder.

Local government lawyers have obtained a QC’s opinion in a dispute with the Solicitors Regulation Authority over their ability to provide reserved legal activities to external bodies and individuals, it has emerged. The move follows complaints that the SRA was forcing councils to set up ABSs.

The Legal Services Board has said it expects the cost of regulating lawyers to be “going down, not up” as it approved a minor increase in the cost of practising for barristers. It said barristers should be given “much greater information” about how their money is spent.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority, once criticised for taking too long to approve alternative business structures, is now regularly approving applications from legal disciplinary practices in only two weeks, it has emerged.

The presence of legal professional privilege creates a “serious distortion to the competitive environment” of the legal services market, the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales has argued. The ICAEW said some law firms marketed themselves on the basis that their advice was confiential.

Four local authorities in the south of England are set to create an alternative business structure in a bid to increase their income in a time of budget cuts. Brighton & Hove City Council, East Sussex County Council, Surrey County Council and West Sussex County Council are first to bring together their legal teams in a partnership.