Stone: Attending today’s LSB board meeting
Relations between the Legal Services Board (LSB) and the Bar Standards Board (BSB) are close to breaking point over the speed of reform at the barrister regulator.
In an exchange of letters published yesterday, BSB chair Kathryn Stone reproached the oversight regulator for acting “in defiance of proper governance”, an accusation his counterpart demanded she withdraw.
She also said that relations between the organisations “appear to be worsening by the day” and complained about the “continued hostility” between the two sides.
They have been strained since 2019, when the BSB controversially decided to stop funding Legal Choices, the consumer-facing website backed by all of the legal regulators – a decision it reversed last year.
This sparked an LSB review whether the BSB was meeting its ‘well-led’ performance standard, which in July 2021 identified a series of leadership and governance failings and then, in late 2022, a warning threatening enforcement action if improvements were not made.
The LSB has a range of powers, such as censures, fines and even the ‘nuclear’ option of withdrawing a regulator’s authorisation.
The BSB has since put in place an improvement programme, the progress of which it provides updates on to the LSB, and in April published a report on its enforcement processes commissioned from City law firm Fieldfisher.
This found that the BSB has the right approach to dealing with complaints about barristers’ conduct but there were “a large number of areas” for improvement. The BSB board accepted the report’s recommendations, meaning its plans for reform need to go further.
The exchange began with a letter in late May from Mr Kershaw saying the LSB board felt the BSB’s response fell “some way short of adequately reflecting the seriousness of the review’s findings”.
He went on: “Fieldfisher’s recommendations are extensive and, in our view, identify important failings in one of the BSB’s fundamental functions.
“The findings around the lack of accountability within the BSB for enforcement processes, and the high level of public dissatisfaction with the BSB, are of particular concern, and have the potential to damage public confidence in the regulation of legal services.”
Mr Kershaw stressed the LSB’s “expectation” that BSB board would act “swiftly, with appropriate resources, to ensure that the extensive shortcomings identified in the review are fully addressed”.
He revived the 2022 threat that the LSB could use its formal powers under the Legal Services Act 2007.
In response, Ms Stone expressed disappointment that Mr Kershaw had not mentioned the positives highlighted by Fieldfisher.
She continued: “It now seems sanctions are being considered for what amounts to the BSB being committed to continuous improvement and open and transparent with our regulator.”
She questioned how the LSB “could have reached such strong conclusions” about the BSB’s commitment to act on the review “apparently without a proper evidence base”, such as attending the meeting at which the BSB board discussed the report.
“You told me during our discussion that your board’s conclusions had been arrived at ‘organically’. And you explained that some members of your board were pushing for more ‘dramatic’ outcomes.
“Such an unevidenced and undocumented approach to decision making was, however, exactly what led the Legal Services Board to find that the Bar Standards Board was not well led when it took the decision in 2019 to withdraw from Legal Choices…
“The only difference is that the Legal Services Board has acted in defiance of proper governance on a much more consequential matter.”
Ms Stone urged the LSB not to construe “due process and sound governance as being indicative of lack of commitment”.
“I would ask that you also appreciate that the current organisation of the Bar Standards Board, adopted in 2019, is hard-wired into policies, processes, job descriptions and IT systems.
“Moving to a new organisation and overhauling our enforcement rules and processes, which is what we intend to do, must be rigorously planned and executed if we are not to destabilise our operations meanwhile.”
Ms Stone wrote again two days later to “record my frustration” at reports of a meeting between BSB and LSB staff, and asked for a meeting with Mr Kershaw “as relations between our organisations appear to be worsening by the day”.
She said: “I understand a perception has taken hold on your board that the Fieldfisher report, which we commissioned as a contribution to improvement, is indicative of deep-seated problems and that the BSB now needs to be supervised to ensure the recommendations are addressed and so to provide assurance to your board.”
This “continued hostility and misperception reflects poorly on both our organisations”, she added.
Ms Stone rejected the LSB’s suggestion that BSB director general Mark Neale meet with it every fortnight, saying it was her board’s role to hold the executive to account, and not the LSB’s.
In the final published letter, Mr Kershaw replied that his board was not “jumping to conclusions” and that he had specifically invited Ms Stone to meet to discuss the issues.
“I ask that you withdraw the BSB’s allegation of poor governance on our part,” he said.
The rest of the letter sought to lower the temperature, however, saying that after an initial meeting at which it would help if Mr Neale attended, “we will leave it to the BSB to determine who is best placed to discuss the details of your plans with the LSB”.
A meeting between the pair was subsequently held, the outcome of which is not in the public domain, and Ms Stone and two board colleagues are due to attend today’s LSB board meeting to discuss the matter further.
manchan wong 
My experience of the BSB was such that I drew the attention of certain failings on their part to the LSB who in turn found my concerns to be well founded. However subsequent complaints to the BSB have been dealt with inexperienced complaint handlers whose decisions are backed to the extent that the conclusions reached are unreasonable and unjustifiable. I support totally the stance of the LSB in relation to the BSB.