News

The Legal Services Board (LSB) is set to probe how independent the Solicitors Regulation Authority truly is from the Law Society. In letters to both bodies, LSB chief executive Chris Kenny said its focus would be on ensuring that “independent regulation is being delivered in practice”.

Sam Stein and Oliver Hanmer of the Bar Standards Board outline the theory and practice behind the new system of chambers monitoring, and the tangible benefits barristers will see from it, including a reduced oversight burden from others

The High Court has ordered a solicitor to hand over client files to a mortgage lender despite his argument that those parts of them relating to the borrowers were covered by legal professional privilege. The judge ruled that express agreements between borrower and lender in each case overrode the right to privilege and confidentiality.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) is set to launch a “thematic review” of legal process outsourcing next year, Legal Futures can reveal. The review would seek to identify whether there are any particular issues or risks that require changes to the current regulatory requirements or whether certain outsourcing arrangements need particular attention in the supervision process.

A former fixed-share partner at south-coast law firm Lester Aldridge has lost his appeal against a ruling that he was a partner and not an employee in the limited liability partnership and so unable to claim unfair dismissal.

Professional indemnity insurers are to provide guidance for solicitors on the way the risk they pose is assessed as part of a push to ensure there is no discrimination in the renewal process. Following a meeting called by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the Association of British Insurers also agreed to work with its members to review their proposal forms and the underpinning criteria used to assess risk, and review and report on the equality and diversity work undertaken by their members.

A company that runs two law centres has become one of the first two organisations ever to be fined for data protection breaches, after personal details of 24,000 clients were lost when an unencrypted laptop was stolen. A4e, a ‘social purpose’ company that jointly manages the Hull and Leicester community legal advice centres, was fined £60,000 by the Information Commissioner.

City law firm Herbert Smith has eschewed offshore outsourcing to set up a document review operation in Belfast. The first firm to establish a UK base for this kind of work, Herbert Smith said it was seeking to take advantage of the “significantly lower case base” in Northern Ireland and the high-quality pool of legal talent there.

The impending legal aid cuts make it a greater priority than ever to ensure poorer people complain if legal services deteriorate, the Legal Ombudsman has declared in the wake of a government decision to scrap a duty on public authorities to reduce inequality caused by socio-economic factors.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has launched an audit of professional indemnity insurers to check they have correctly declared the amount of premium income they received during the recent renewal.