Tag Results
Edmonds: cut length of legal education to shrink student debt
Monday, 22 November 2010Growing 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.
Tags: bar standards board, ethics, ILEX Professional Standards, legal education, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Barristers, hrtraining, Legal Executives, Legal Services Board, News, Solicitors
Regulators set out terms of training review
Friday, 19 November 2010The three biggest legal regulators have set out the terms of their two-year joint review of education and training. The review – being undertaken by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the Bar Standards Board and ILEX Professional Standards – will examine the educational requirements placed upon individuals entering the sector and their regulatory function.
Tags: bar standards board, ILEX Professional Standards, legal education, Legal Services Board, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Barristers, hrtraining, Latest news, Legal Executives, Solicitors
Edmonds to back regulators’ education and training review as LSB role is curbed
Thursday, 18 November 2010Legal 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.
Tags: bar standards board, continuing professional development, ILEX Professional Standards, legal education, Legal Services Board, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Barristers, Latest news, Legal Executives, Legal Services Board, Solicitors
No accounting for taste
Thursday, 18 November 2010When then shadow justice minister Henry Bellingham last year floated the idea that some client account interest should be applied to the legal aid fund rather than solicitors’ pockets, some thought it one of the barmier suggestions of ways to supplement public funding. But even though Mr Bellingham has moved on, the idea has not, as proved by this week’s legal aid green paper.
Tags: client account interest, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Blog
Focus on assigned risks pool forces SRA to cut down other monitoring visits
Monday, 15 November 2010The focus on law firms in the assigned risks pool has led to a significant fall in the number of other monitoring visits conducted by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), Legal Futures can report. The SRA says the move is an example of its shift towards risk-based regulation.
Tags: ARP, assigned risks pool, monitoring, practice standards unit, Solicitors Regulation Authority, SRA
Posted in News, Solicitors
Consumers welcome quality assurance for advocates but say scheme has big failings
Friday, 12 November 2010Mandatory quality assurance for criminal advocates is welcome but the scheme currently proposed by the legal profession falls short in several significant ways, the Legal Services Consumer Panel said today. Among the problems are a failure to consider consumer needs, weaker standards than had been consulted on, and allowing advocates to choose which cases they are assessed on.
Tags: advocacy, bar standards board, ILEX Professional Standards, Joint Advocacy Group, Legal Services Consumer Panel, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Barristers, Consumer panel, Legal Executives, News, Solicitors
Inexorable growth of solicitors’ profession as number on roll tops 150,000
Thursday, 11 November 2010The number of solicitors has grown by nearly 50%, and the number of firms by a third, in the past decade, Legal Futures research has discovered. According to SRA figures, for the first time the number of solicitors on the roll has topped 150,000 (it is now 153,971), and the number of practising solicitors has gone over 120,000 (120,917).
Tags: Solicitors Regulation Authority, SRA
Posted in News, Solicitors
The knock on the door
Thursday, 11 November 2010An intervention into a solicitors’ practice is a drastic step and one which invariably results in the closure of the practice and often in the bankruptcy of the solicitor who is intervened in. It is because of this that pressure from the Law Society and others has been placed on the SRA and it now appears to have started considering alternatives to intervention wherever possible.
Tags: intervention, Solicitors Regulation Authority, SRA
Posted in Blog
Lenders “dislike” separate representation of borrowers but investigate guidance
Wednesday, 10 November 2010The Council of Mortgage Lenders has launched an investigation into the impact of more borrowers and lenders having separate legal representation as lenders continue to restrict their panels, it has emerged. It has also given a cautious welcome to the Law Society’s new conveyancing quality scheme and sounded a warning over suggestions that the requirements of solicitors’ professional indemnity insurance will be relaxed.
Tags: conveyancing, Law Society, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in Indemnity insurance, News, Solicitors
Up to 60 "seriously risky" firms in the ARP
Wednesday, 10 November 2010Some 240 of the 336 law firms in the assigned risks pool (ARP) are new to the insurance safety net, with 10-20% of the total thought to pose a “serious risk”, it has emerged. Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) papers show that 30-60 firms are in the serious risk category and face immediate SRA investigations, with referrals for regulatory action to be made where appropriate.
Tags: assigned risks pool, professional indemnity insurance, Solicitors Regulation Authority
Posted in News, Solicitors