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The ban on referral fees is likely to take the form of a criminal offence, Lord Chancellor Ken Clarke revealed yesterday. Meanwhile, Jack Straw has called for the fees payable to lawyers under the road traffic accident portal to be halved to £600.

Government plans to reduce the amount of litigation in the county courts by introducing mandatory pre-action directions will undermine the constitutional principle of access to the courts, the Civil Justice Council (CJC) has warned. The news comes as the CJC’s role in implementing the Jackson reforms has also been revealed.

The turnover of claims management companies (CMC) soared by 57% to £581m over the past year, despite a ten-fold increase in the number of businesses having their authorisation cancelled, their regulator has reported.

The furore over referral fees has come out of nowhere. In the past three weeks, the Sunday Times, the Daily Mail, the Sunday Telegraph and, this week, The Times with the help of Jack Straw, have all climbed into the trade in claims. There has been an increasing focus on the role of insurance companies – referral fees’ most vehement critic – in actually fuelling them, which has certainly put the industry on the spot. The “if we don’t do it, everyone else will” argument put forward by the Association of British Insurers is not exactly an attractive one.

The great majority of consumers who have used legal services are satisfied with the outcome, although many do not feel they received good value for money, a survey has found. Worryingly for lawyers likely to face competition from trusted brands after October, however, it suggested significant public distrust of lawyers.