All Law Gazette articles in Archive – Page 1599
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News
Plain speaking
Here is a test for your readers. Read aloud, without pause, the full names of the following (all taken from a single edition of the Gazette): LDP, ABS, SDT, RTA, ABI, APIL, CLS, ADR, CBA, CFA, COLP, COFA, ALS, MoJ, LSB, CQS and SRA. Of course, as a profession we ...
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News
Time to rebuild the small print
Speaking in the House of Lords on 25 July 1988 in the debate on what was to become the Housing Act 1988, the Earl of Caithness, on behalf of the then government, said: ‘One of the points frequently made about the old-style shorthold tenancy procedure [i.e. the protected shorthold under ...
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Spreading the word
Devon & Somerset Law Society welcomes the president’s call for local law societies to reassess their role. DASLS has just launched its business plan for the next three years. Part of our strategy is to put junior and in-house lawyers at the centre of the plan. We are also committed ...
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Claims managers get the blame for PI spike
The legal profession has rounded on claims management companies after a sharp spike in personal injury claims following road accidents. Figures from the Institute of Actuaries released this week show the proportion of accidents involving bodily injury rose by 18% last year. This was at a ...
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Feature
BOOK REVIEW Joy
Author: Jonathan Lee On a Friday afternoon at the glass offices of Hanger, Slyde & Stein in London’s Square Mile, newly promoted partner Joy Stephens is standing on a second-floor platform, giving a big speech to colleagues below her. ...
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Freshfields and Linklaters dampen magic circle celebrations
Magic circle rivals Linklaters and Freshfields have recorded modest financial results to end a week of announcements by the UK’s biggest firms.
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Patents - it’s not over after all
Those of you who are following the twists and turns of the European patent saga should know that the fat lady has not yet sung. The Gazette wisely said in their recent article that the saga ‘appears to have been settled’. But appearances are known to be deceptive, and the ...
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SRA eases insurers’ disclosure rules
Professional indemnity insurers will not be required to tell solicitors if their credit rating changes during the year of cover, regulators have decided. Following lobbying from the insurance industry, the Solicitors Regulation Authority has eased rules regarding insurers’ disclosure. Under the Qualifying Insurer’s Agreement approved earlier ...
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Are GCs prevented from forcing down fees?
I heard a depressing tale last week that will be familiar to many lawyers working in the in-house sector. A general counsel was dealing with a substantial piece of litigation. He had chosen to give the job to a good silver circle firm, and was very ...
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News
World Pride 2012
Photo gallery - New Law Society president Lucy Scott-Moncrieff was among the marchers at World Pride 2012 in London last weekend. The event saw the legal sector continue its tradition of marching together for equality and justice for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people around ...
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Djanogly: QOCS applies to all
Qualified one-way costs-shifting (QOCS) will apply to all personal injury claimants no matter what their financial means, the Ministry of Justice has confirmed. In a written ministerial statement today, justice minister Jonathan Djanogly (pictured) said there would be no financial test to determine eligibility. The new ...
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Bar-solicitor divisions ‘music to government’s ears’
Two leading criminal lawyers have called for solicitors and barristers to stop arguing among themselves and unite, to promote their clients' interests and the justice system. President of the London Criminal Courts Solicitors Association Jim Meyer said both branches of the profession are struggling due to ...
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Cuts opponents fuelled by self-interest, says Clarke
The lord chancellor has accepted that not enough progress has been made to increase judicial diversity - and labelled the profession’s lobbying over the legal cuts ‘predictable’ and not client-centred. Talking to Justice director Roger Smith last night in an event hosted by Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, ...
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IRA interviews judgment - history is the loser
This week a US appeal court was asked to choose between the value of law and justice on the one hand, and the value of political stability and academic history on the other. In ordering Boston College to hand over interviews conducted for an oral history project with a convicted ...
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Mix and match
First let me say how pleased I am the Law Society backs the idea of a standard professional indemnity insurance proposal form. The process of getting quotes for indemnity insurance is made much more time-consuming by having to fill out a form for each broker or insurance company. I would ...
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News
ABS pioneer condemns ‘over-qualification’ in firms
Law firms have for too long relied upon 'closed clubs of equity partners' to keep fees artificially high, a speaker from one of the first wave of alternative business structures told the Legal Education and Training Review (LETR) Symposium in Manchester today.
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News
LSC improvements fail to satisfy auditor
The National Audit Office has qualified the Legal Services Commission’s accounts for the fourth year running due to overpayments made to providers. The LSC’s annual report, published today, revealed a substantial drop in expenditure in 2011-12, in large part reflecting the fact it funded almost a ...
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Don’t cut corners, LeO warns firms
Competition from new market entrants is forcing law firms to offer services and prices they cannot hope to deliver, according to the Legal Ombudsman. In his second annual report, Adam Sampson (pictured) raises concerns that under-pressure firms are cutting corners and making unrealistic promises. He ...
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Judicial applications up 17%
A record number of candidates applied for judicial appointments last year, the Judicial Appointment Commission’s latest annual report reveals. There were 5,490 applications in 2011-12, of which 746 resulted in the appointment of tribunal chairs, recorders, district judges, deputy district judges, circuit judges and high court ...
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Final consultation launched on advocacy accreditation
A fourth - and ‘final’ - consultation on the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) published today contains a number of ‘significant’ changes that solicitors’ representative groups have welcomed.