Solicitors

The owner of a personal injury firm has been struck off after retaining nearly £500,000 in disbursements to keep his firm afloat after it was badly hit by the LASPO reforms.

Leading law firm Womble Bond Dickinson has been rebuked for providing a banking facility to a client by receiving and paying out more than £2m that did not relate to any legal work it was doing.

Legal regulators should allow unregulated firms to test their ideas in regulatory sandboxes set up to foster innovation, the Legal Services Consumer Panel has said.

There has been a 9% increase in the number of complaints to law firms last year, but they continue to resolve eight out of 10 themselves, according to official statistics.

A conveyancing paralegal who tried to cover up her mistake in not sending an updated plan to the buyers’ solicitor has been banned from working in the profession.

An assistant solicitor who took over a firm after the principal was struck off allowed her to keep practising under her maiden name, use the firm’s office and be sole signatory on its bank accounts.

A solicitor has been rebuked for trying to include a ban on her former employer referring her to any regulatory authority as part of a settlement of disputes between the two.

An MP has urged select committees to investigate the role of law firms – and in particular Herbert Smith Freehills – in helping client companies accused of wrongdoing set up compensation schemes.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority is to end the practice of allowing trainee solicitors to obtain higher rights of audience but has reversed course on its proposed approach to advocacy in the youth courts.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has decided to implement its controversial plan to cut the maximum award from its Compensation Fund from £2m to £500,000.

The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal rejected a quarter of the outcomes agreed by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and defendants last year, its annual report has revealed.

Lawyers acting for whistleblowers have told MPs and peers that they can feel intimidated to raise concerns over non-disclosure agreements because of the threat of retaliation.

Larger law firms face a new levy of £100-200 per £1m of revenue to support the government’s economic crime plan, under proposals outlined by the Treasury yesterday.

A compliance officer for finance and administration who helped the firm’s owner use £500,000 received for disbursements to prop up the firm has accepted a ban from the profession.

A law firm partner who asked if it was acceptable to call a gay trainee solicitor a “poofter” – and repeated the question to the trainee – has been fined £4,000 by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.