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Regulators of alternative business structures could expose consumers to risk if they demand an overly high standard of proof in disciplinary hearings, the Legal Services Consumer Panel has warned. Meanwhile, the Bar Standards Board is to consider switching to a civil standard of proof.

Lord Justice Thomas is heading a new expert group to advise the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Bar Standards Board and ILEX Professional Standards on developing and operating the controversial quality assurance for advocates scheme, it has emerged. Meanwhile, the BSB has hit out again at the Legal Services Board’s “unhelpful and ill-timed” intervention over the scheme.

The Legal Services Board is explicitly threatening the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Bar Standards Board and ILEX Professional Standards with using its formal enforcement powers for the first time over their quality assurance for advocates scheme, Legal Futures can reveal. The regulators have branded the move as neither “helpful nor necessary”.

Growing student debt means the length of time would-be lawyers spend studying needs to shrink, the chairman of the Legal Services Board has declared. David Edmonds also floated the idea of adopting the accountants’ training model, in which professional training takes place during full-time employment, while appearing to throw cold water on the idea of aptitude testing for students before they begin postgraduate legal education.

Legal Services Board (LSB) chairman David Edmonds will tomorrow back a review of legal education and training but warn that he expects it to be far-reaching, Legal Futures has learned. However, we understand that the LSB had originally planned to conduct the review itself, but has been persuaded to let the Solicitors Regulation Authority, Bar Standards Board and ILEX Professional Standards take the lead under the LSB’s oversight.