Legal Services Act

The Legal Services Board has put a temporary block on plans by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to widen its net to cover providers that do not need to be regulated. It said the reforms “could be seen as a significant shift in the regulation of legal services”.

The barrister who defended one of the killers of Drummer Lee Rigby is involved in setting up an alternative business structure (ABS) with another member of his chambers and two senior staff.

The listed company that owns NewLaw Solicitors has completed its acquisition of a fleet accident management group that itself has a joint venture alternative business structure (ABS) with NewLaw. Meanwhile, would-be ABS Metamorph Law will shortly have a £4m warchest that will enable it to buy at least five firms next year.

Rather than feeling threatened by accountants’ move into legal services, law firms should set up alternative business structures (ABS) and compete with them, the president of the Law Society has said. Jonathan Smithers said: “The success of ABS to date indicates that clients are generally not concerned about sourcing their legal services from non-lawyers.”

Clients may not need detailed information about separate businesses when work is referred to them by their law firm owners, the Solicitors Regulation Authority has said. The Legal Services Consumer Panel has warned that the new separate business rule could leave consumers in the dark.

Insisting on an upper second class degree for future barristers could impose a “discriminatory burden” on BAME students, who are less likely to obtain them, a leading academic has argued in response to a Bar Standards Board consultation that raises the possibility.

Former Chief Legal Ombudsman Adam Sampson was dismissed with notice from his post, the Office for Legal Complaints has now said – having previously indicated that he was not. However, Mr Sampson is maintaining his position that he resigned and served out his six-month notice period.

The number of alternative business structures licensed by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) has hit 100, it has emerged. A further 47 firms have been authorised to provide probate services.

A former City solicitor has been appointed as the new chief executive of the Legal Services Board – the first lawyer to hold the post. Neil Buckley, who spent eight years at Sinclair Roche & Temperley (now part of Stephenson Harwood), joins in January from Ofcom.

Solicitors who refer consumers to their unregulated businesses under the revised separate business rule may obtain consent to do so, but there is a serious risk that it will not be informed, a member of the Legal Services Consumer Panel has warned.

A local authority legal department which recently warned that council lawyers are being forced to set up alternative business structures by restrictive rules on in-house practice, has won backing to do just that. Essex Legal Services predicted that it could make an additional surplus of £1.8m by 2020.

Mergers have been unveiled across the country in recent days, with firms of all sizes and practice areas choosing to join forces. There is usually a rush of mergers each year timed to coincide with the 30 September deadline to secure professional indemnity insurance, and 2015 has proven no different.

Any short-term “bonanza” in legal work triggered by Britain’s exit from the EU would be followed by a drought, City lawyers have warned in a report by the Law Society. The society highlighted the impact on England and Wales as a centre of international dispute resolution.

Barristers are shunning the chance to go into direct competition with solicitors and conduct litigation for clients in addition to their advocacy, it has emerged. Delegates at Saturday’s Bar conference also heard that while public access also remains “under the radar”, there is evidence of clients preferring the cheaper option of going direct to a barrister.

Most of the top 100 law firms now recognise ‘the need to respond to the digital age’ in the face of market disruptors, but less than a quarter have actually done so, accountants PwC have found.