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If we are to judge the success of a regulator by the degree to which it really annoys those it regulates, then the Legal Services Board (LSB) has done an absolutely bang-up job these past three years. It is just over 12 months since I first blogged about whispers questioning the long-term need for the LSB once independent regulation, the Legal Ombudsman and alternative business structures were all up and running. Well, they are whispers no more.

The Bar Council has attacked the Legal Services Board’s “overconfidence” and criticised its apparent desire to become a “super-regulator” rather than an oversight body. It said the LSB’s plans has ambitions to be involved in areas of activity where it should not be.

The government last week rejected a Bar Council-inspired bid to protect lawyer-client conversations from covert police surveillance where legal professional privilege is not being abused in furtherance of a criminal purpose. However, the Bar Council has vowed to press on with its campaign.

The Legal Services Board, Bar Council and 10 top law firms have signed the government’s ‘Business Compact’ on social mobility to end the “who you know, not what you know” culture, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has announced.

Some solicitors are putting barristers under “increasing pressure” to enter into referral fee arrangements, while others are trying to take “improper advantage” of advocates by abusing the ‘one case, one fee’ rules in criminal work, the Bar Council has complained.