All articles by Catherine Baksi – Page 25
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Courts staff to strike this afternoon
Courts staff will strike this afternoon over government plans to privatise the collection of fines, the Public and Commercial Services union said.
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Advocacy quality scheme gets final go-ahead
The Legal Services Board today gave the final go-ahead to the controversial Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates, citing poor standards of advocacy to justify its introduction.
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Saunders is new DPP as job goes to insider
Alison Saunders will succeed Keir Starmer QC as director of public prosecutions at the Crown Prosecution Service, the attorney general announced today. She joined the CPS in 1986, the year it was set up, and is the first DPP to be appointed from within the ranks of the prosecuting agency. ...
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Regulator defiant over licensing One Legal
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has defended its decision to grant an alternative business structure licence to a company owned by Trevor Howarth, the legal director of Stobart Barristers, who faces a possible trial for contempt of court. The SRA last week licensed One Legal, a company set up in September ...
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‘Corporation’ future considered for courts as government denies sell-off
An ‘independent public interest corporation’ may take over the ownership of courts and tribunals, the government revealed today. In a letter to judges on plans to reform HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS), the lord chancellor Chris Grayling, the lord chief justice Lord Judge and the senior president of tribunals ...
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NewsMother loses Euro court compensation fight
Mike Pemberton acted for Lorraine Allen, who was imprisoned after wrongly being convicted of the manslaughter of her son.
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Healthcheck detects public unease at bar regulator 'bias'
Complainants to the Bar Standards Board have accused the regulator of bias in favour of barristers as dissatisfaction grows about transparency and openness. The BSB’s yearly healthcheck survey found increasing public unease about its complaints process, despite the number of complaints falling in the past year. At the board’s monthly ...
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SRA approves £50-£350 charge scale for advocacy accreditation
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has approved the fees that solicitors will be required to pay for accreditation under the controversial Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA). Fees are set for the four accreditation levels and solicitors will have to make payment on registration, on progression and when seeking reaccreditation. To ...
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Lack of demand shuts first one-stop shop for offenders
England’s first ‘all in one’ court and offender treatment centre is set for closure due to under-use, the justice minister announced today. Helen Grant announced a six-week consultation on plans to shut North Liverpool Community Justice Centre and move its work and the principles of its problem-solving approach to Sefton ...
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NewsJudicial satire is deadly serious
Price-competitive tendering for judges. That is the subject of a spoof essay of application for the job of lord chief justice, penned by Court of Appeal judge Sir Alan Moses (‘aged 67½’), demonstrating the absurdity of the government’s planned legal aid reforms. The sitting judge read his work ‘What I ...
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'Little hope' for sole practitioners in criminal defence
There is ‘little hope for the future’ for sole practitioners and many small law firms under either the government’s or Law Society’s proposals for reshaping the criminal defence market, the Sole Practitioners Group has claimed. The group’s legal aid spokesperson, former chair Hilary Underwood, told the Gazette that under either ...
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CPS has 'more in-house lawyers than it needs'
The Crown Prosecution Service has too many in-house lawyers as it continues to face the challenges of budget cuts, according to the annual report of the agency’s inspectorate. Her Majesty’s CPS Inspectorate said a lack of resources due to budget cuts is hampering the service’s ability to prepare cases, but ...
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Further grilling for Chris Grayling over PCT
Justice secretary Chris Grayling will be summoned to be appear before the House of Commons justice committee for a second time to examine the government’s proposed cuts to legal aid, it was revealed today. Publishing a report on the evidence it had heard on the Transforming ...
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Sir John Thomas will be next lord chief justice
Sir John Thomas is to succeed Lord Judge as lord chief justice, Number 10 Downing Street confirmed today. Thomas was chosen over the two other applicants – Lady Justice Hallett, who is currently Thomas’s deputy at the Queen’s Bench Division and who chaired the 7/7 London bombing inquest; and Lord ...
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Women being imprisoned unnecessarily, reformers say
Magistrates’ courts are sending fewer women to prison than in previous years but some courts are four times more likely to jail women than others, according to figures obtained by the Howard League for Penal Reform. Research by the charity reveals that although the overall number of women being sent ...
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Bar’s disciplinary system on trial in High Court
The legality of the bar’s disciplinary system has been called into question this week as the High Court hears three claims for judicial review. The cases have been brought by three barristers in relation to charges of professional misconduct brought by the Bar Standards’ Board. In each case the charges ...
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Firms asked to cut rates for armed forces
A nationwide scheme to offer discounted legal fees to armed forces personnel is being set up by a solicitor in the RAF, the Gazette has learned. Armed Forces Legal Action (AFLA) is the brainchild of Wing Commander Allan Steele supported by Scottish solicitor Janet Hood. Firms across the UK will ...
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Society warns against jailing ‘reckless’ bankers
New criminal sanctions that would jail senior bankers for ‘reckless misconduct’ will not stop banks failing or help to promote economic growth, the Law Society said today. Chancery Lane’s warning comes as the government is accused of watering down proposals made last month by the parliamentary commission on banking standards. ...
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Rehabilitation reforms treat women as ‘afterthought’ – MPs
Women offenders are an afterthought in the government’s rehabilitation reforms, the House of Commons justice committee suggested today. Six years after the Corston Report, which recommended that only the most serious female offenders be jailed, the committee said that the women’s prison population has not fallen sufficiently quickly and that ...
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FeatureActed for Angolan man unlawfully killed
Who? Mark Scott, 47, partner at London firm Bhatt Murphy. Why is he in the news? Represented the family of Jimmy Mubenga, a 46-year-old Angolan who an inquest jury found had been unlawfully killed after being restrained by three G4S guards on a BA flight while being deported. In their ...