All Law Gazette articles in Archive – Page 1636
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QASA curtailment beggars belief
I read each week with growing dismay about the long-running saga of the Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates. This misconceived and unwelcome intrusion into the liberties of our profession may one day restrict, if not deny, our hard-won rights of audience in the higher courts.
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Pro bono - minding the gap
The tough economic climate, coupled with the threat to frontline advice agencies from local authority and legal aid cuts, has dramatically increased demand for free legal help. National Pro Bono Week, which starts on 5 November, will focus attention on the question ‘is something better than nothing?’ as law firms ...
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Ignoring PACE was not ‘brave’
Is Christopher Halliwell, 48, really likely to ‘walk free’ when he has served the 25-year minimum term he was given for murdering 22-year-old Sian O’Callaghan, as one newspaper reported on Saturday? Sentencing him to life imprisonment a day earlier, Mrs Justice Cox told him: ‘If you are eventually released on ...
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UK contingent in Brazil
The Law Society will tell the Brazilian legal sector today that Britain is the place to turn to for international dispute resolution, as it leads a contingent of UK law firms to São Paulo. President Lucy Scott-Moncrieff, whose visit coincides with the Lord Mayor’s trip to ...
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Litigation funder targets case ‘portfolios’
One of the UK’s biggest litigation funders is in talks with law firms about using alternative business structures to invest in a ‘portfolio’ of their commercial litigation. The move by Harbour Litigation Funding signals what is expected to become a closer relationship between law firms and ...
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Victims of human trafficking and the CCRC
The Criminal Cases Review Commission (the CCRC) is warning that both defence and prosecution lawyers need to become more alert to the issues relating to victims of human trafficking if miscarriages of justice are to be avoided.
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Salford claims centre rates poorly with solicitors
Almost two-thirds of users of the Salford civil claims centre rate the service as poor, according to a survey reflecting continued frustration with the new central facility. The figure is among the findings of a poll of 47 legal firms, 40 of which ...
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Off centre
Taking up where Nye Moloney left off, I have found the County Court Money Claims Centre (CCMCC) to be lacking. I am uncertain as to how the interaction between the centre and the Northampton Bulk Issue Centre pans out in practice.
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Civil rights concern over costs-shifting
Lawyers representing claimants against the police have warned that abuses of state power will go unchallenged under costs reforms coming into force in April. The Police Actions Lawyers Group wants qualified one-way costs-shifting extended from personal injury to cover all civil liberties cases.
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Effective extradition and rights must be combined
by Jago Russell, chief executive of Fair Trials International The Gary McKinnon case has again caught the attention following the home secretary’s recent announcement on extradition reform.
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Support costs
Once upon a time we filled in the form to renew our annual practising certificates by hand and then continued to do proper work. Now the Gazette brims with articles on the regulatory process and how to live with it. Charles Plant tells us the ...
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Court interpreter mess ‘led to custody’, MPs told
Defendants are being remanded in custody solely because court interpreters have not been sent by the company contracted by the Ministry of Justice to provide them, a parliamentary committee heard this week. Giving evidence to the Justice Committee, the chair of the Law Society’s criminal law ...
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Profit a ‘dirty word’ in law, says Dragon’s Den judge
Entrepreneur and investor James Caan has revealed he found a culture where profit was a ‘dirty word’ when he looked to buy a law firm. Former Dragons Den judge Caan, whose private investment company Hamilton Bradshaw bought Midlands firm Knights in June, said he had spoken ...
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Detrimental move?
Bradbury v Taylor & Burkinshaw [2012] EWCA Civ 1208 This is a slightly unusual proprietary estoppel case in that it was brought by the alleged promisor, Bill, who sought a declaration that the defendants had no beneficial interest in his house. They counterclaimed for a ...
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Employment
Pay – Statutory minimum Nambalat v Tayeb and another; Udin v Chamsi-Pasha and others: Court of Appeal, Civil Division (Lord Justice Pill, Lady Justice Black and Mr Justice Bean): 5 October 2012 ...
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Expensive Saga
At the sort of prices Saga is quoting I do not think the average high street conveyancer should lose any sleep. I just obtained a quote from Saga for a freehold sale at £150k and a freehold purchase at £250k – a typical, everyday transaction outside ...
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Medical expert witness independence
Britain is the whiplash capital of Europe, with more than 1,500 claims a day, including people claiming for whiplash injuries sustained in the most minor of incidents. In May 2011, the House of Commons Transport Committee published a report into the cost of motor insurance, warning that spiralling costs are ...
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Extradition
Extradition order – Application for stay of extradition R (on the application of Fawaz) v Secretary of State for Home Department; R (on the application of Bary) v Secretary of State for Home Department; R (on the application of ...
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Mediation is the future, Falconer says
The Supreme Court’s equal pay ruling yesterday will lead to ‘billions and billions worth of claims’ Labour’s former lord chancellor has predicted. Lord Falconer (pictured) suggested that such claims be mediated rather than leaving them to the ‘vagaries of the legal system’, which he said would be costly and could ...