All articles by Catherine Baksi – Page 105
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News
Litigation: (nearly) the new alternative dispute resolution?
CEDR Solve, the dispute resolution services arm of the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution, announced that it has just dealt with its 15,000th referred dispute since its launch in 1990...
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News
Firms face ‘legal exposure’ over cancelled contracts
Law firms risk ‘reputational damage and legal exposure’ as increasing numbers of firms seek to defer or cancel training contracts due to the recession, a leading employment lawyer has warned. City firms Denton Wilde Sapte and LG are the latest to ask their prospective September 2009 ...
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News
Tax prosecutors to merge with CPS
The Revenue and Customs Prosecutions Office (RCPO) is to merge with the Crown Prosecution Service four years after it was set up, in a move to save public money and improve efficiency. The Attorney General, Lady Scotland QC (pictured), announced the change following a review of ...
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News
Only 14 firms become first-wave LDPs
The legal profession has largely snubbed the first wave of the Legal Services Act’s business structure reforms, with only 14 legal disciplinary practices up and running as the new regime came into force on Tuesday. The takeup remained low despite a one-month extension to the original ...
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News
Access to civil justice is failing, says Association of District Judges president
Access to justice in the civil courts is worse than it was a decade ago and is set to decline further, according to the new president of the Association of District Judges. David Oldham, who took over last week from Edwina Millward, said that repeated ...
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News
Straw announces date and details of family court openings
Family court hearings in county courts and the High Court will be opened to the media from Monday 27 April, subject to parliamentary approval, justice secretary Jack Straw announced today. Media representatives who wish to attend family courts will need to be holders of the UK ...
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News
Child care application charges under parliamentary fire
Pressure is mounting on the government to abolish fees for child care application proceedings following two parliamentary interventions. Lord Laming (pictured), who investigated the deaths of Victoria Climbié and Baby P, told MPs last week that he sees no need for fees. Meanwhile Sir ...
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News
First legal executive appointed partner
The Institute of Legal Executives announced that for the first time a legal executive has been appointed a partner in a legal disciplinary partnership. Nick Hanning (pictured), a legal executive with Poole law firm RWPS, took up his new status on 31 March, when LDPs came ...
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News
Practitioners condemn best value tendering for police station work
Practitioner groups have condemned the government’s ‘reckless’ and ‘cavalier’ decision to go ahead with the introduction of best value tendering (BVT) for criminal legal aid work. The Legal Services Commission last week announced that the scheme, under which firms bid for work at police stations, will ...
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News
Draft bill would create two new bribery offences
Practitioners have welcomed government proposals to reform ‘antiquated’ bribery laws to create a framework of two general offences of giving and accepting bribes. Justice secretary Jack Straw last week published a draft bribery bill, modelled on recommendations made in the Law Commission’s November 2008 Report, Reforming ...
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News
Conveyancing solicitors warned on liability for incomplete searches in HIPs
Conveyancing solicitors could be liable for buyers’ losses if they accept defective searches, Law Society President Paul Marsh has warned, as new regulations on the contents of home information packs come into force. From next Monday, transitional measures that allowed packs to include incomplete personal local ...
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News
You have the right to phone a solicitor – for now
The Legal Services Commission has published its second consultation paper on best value tendering (BVT) for criminal defence work in police stations and magistrates’ courts.
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Profile
Interview: Dominic Grieve, shadow justice secretary
Britain could have a Conservative government in little over a year, or even sooner. What would that mean for solicitors? Catherine Baksi spoke to Dominic Grieve QC, the shadow justice secretary, to find out.
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News
Family legal aid fees will leave solicitors worse off
The proposed fixed fees for family legal aid work will leave solicitors worse off, according to a Law Society survey published today.
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News
Tories ponder ways to alleviate legal aid ‘crisis’
A contingency legal aid fund and private sector investment are among proposals being considered by the Conservatives to overhaul a legal aid system ‘in crisis’, shadow justice secretary Dominic Grieve QC told the Gazette in an interview published today on our website.
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News
Pro bono winners urged to apply for costs
The former attorney general has urged pro bono lawyers to use new legislation to apply for costs when they win a case, to support wider access to justice. Lord Goldsmith told City Law School’s pro bono fair that lawyers doing pro bono cases can apply for costs orders under section ...
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News
No more automatic secrecy for disciplined judges
The names of judges removed from office following disciplinary proceedings will no longer be kept secret, justice secretary Jack Straw (pictured) announced last week. Launching the second annual report of the Office of Judicial Complaints (OJC), he said there would now be a presumption that ...
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News
BSB to revamp barristers’ code
The Bar Standards Board is to overhaul the barristers’ code of conduct to bring it into line with other regulatory instruments and create a set of ‘clear and user friendly’ professional rules. It will be the first structural change to the code since its introduction in 1981.
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News
Solicitors more trusted than barristers
Solicitors are the most trusted of the white-collar professions, according to a survey carried out for the Bar Standards Board (BSB).
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News
Social welfare boost
A quarter of a million more people will qualify for help with social welfare problems following a 5% rise in the cut-off threshold for civil legal aid, the Ministry of Justice announced last week. Lord Bach, legal aid minister, told the Advice Services Alliance conference in ...