Good-quality advocacy is essential to protect the public and deliver fair results in the criminal justice system.

Last month the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) and ILEX Professional Standards (IPS), came a step closer to radically overhauling the quality assurance of criminal advocates with all three boards approving a new scheme, subject to assurances on a few key issues.

The new approach, the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocacy, addresses the competence requirements for criminal advocates at all levels of practice.

It will ensure that the quality of advocacy builds on existing education and training routes to produce a robust, proportionate and effective scheme while allowing advocates to decide which assessment method best fits their circumstances.

Why are changes necessary? The new scheme stems from Lord Carter’s 2006 report alluding to a ‘client-driven need for the quality assurance of advocacy... as a vital part of an effective justice system’.

Currently, those who undertake advocacy in the criminal courts may have qualified through different routes with varying methods of education, training and assessment.

It has become apparent that a clearer and more consistent standard is needed.

This system may have worked in the past but with a rapidly changing legal landscape, coupled with competition and commercial issues, there is a need for a more active approach to ensure that advocates are able to perform well at the point of qualification and throughout their careers.

Lawyers, clients, the public and the judiciary need to be satisfied that advocates appearing in the criminal courts are operating to consistent standards.

The Joint Advocacy Group (JAG), which was formed in late 2009 and is made up of the SRA, BSB and IPS, has created a credible and robust scheme which is consistent with the regulatory objectives set out in the Legal Services Act 2007.

It will ensure a common set of standards for criminal advocates working at all levels, from recently qualified advocates appearing in their first cases to those undertaking the most serious and complex work in the Crown court.

It will provide a much clearer benchmark by which everyone, including solicitors and barristers, will be assessed.

At the heart of the new scheme is flexibility.

In most circumstances, criminal advocates will be able to decide whether they are assessed by judicial evaluation or through an external assessment organisation.

Advocates will be able to determine the most suitable assessment method for them based on their circumstances.

Judicial evaluation will suit some advocates and assessment organisations will suit others - advocates need to identify the method which suits their circumstances best.

The JAG’s role is to ensure that both assessment methods are valid and reliable, and to evaluate their effectiveness within the first few years of the scheme’s operation.

Ensuring that a judge’s focus remains firmly on the case in hand, rather than on assessing advocates, remains of the utmost importance.

Advocates will decide at the end of a trial whether or not they would like the judge to complete a criminal advocacy evaluation form, so the process will be in the control of the advocate and the judge’s focus will be on the trial.

The scheme has been developed following two extensive consultations with the profession which have resulted in significant changes to our original proposals.

I would like to thank everyone who took part in these.

A further consultation forum is being held on Monday 25 July from 9.30am to 1.30pm at the Law Society, Chancery Lane, London.

This provides a further opportunity for the profession to give its views on the scheme and to ask representatives from the JAG any questions.

To book a place please visit the SRA site.

Judicial evaluation is being robustly piloted, most recently at Canterbury and Durham Crown courts, and further trials will take place in late July and the autumn.

The aim of the pilot has been to gather data on the criminal advocacy evaluation form as a tool for assessing live advocacy performance in a court-room setting.

The SRA board approved the scheme last month subject to an assurance that all judges would be fully trained to carry out effective judicial assessment.

I recently met Lord Justice Thomas, chair of the JAG, who provided an assurance that all judges would be trained in advance of the scheme being introduced.

The proposals will be submitted to the Legal Services Board for initial approval in July and full submission in September.

We are looking to introduce the scheme in phases from January 2012, with the initial accreditation of criminal advocates at levels 3 or 4. Live assessment of advocates at levels 3 and 4, either by judicial evaluation or by assessment organisation, will begin in March 2012.

We have created a robust and effective assessment system which will uphold the highest professional standards and, most importantly, ensure that the public can be confident about the quality of those providing criminal advocacy at all levels.

However, we do not have any plans to extend this scheme to other areas of advocacy.

Finally, I would like to remind readers there are now fewer than 90 days until the launch of outcomes-focused regulation on 6 October and you have until 31 March 2012 to appoint your compliance officer for legal practice and compliance officer for finance and administration.

Please visit the Freedom in Practice page for full information on the changes to the way solicitors will be regulated.

Charles Plant is chair of the board of the Solicitors Regulation Authority