Julia Mazur may not know it, but her name will have been spoken about in virtually every law firm in England and Wales since last week.
It is difficult to recall another case that has set off such tremors in the legal profession. Where court judgments usually provide certainty and precedent, Mazur brings trepidation and recrimination.
On the surface, Mr Justice Sheldon’s ruling reaffirmed the Legal Services Act by stating that individuals must be authorised if they are to conduct litigation and that being employed by a law firm is not sufficient to clear this hurdle, even if the work is supervised.
The trouble with relying on the LSA is that the profession – in part driven by further legislation from Westminster – has moved on significantly since 2007.
An ecosystem developed in the intervening years whereby firms under pressure to work under fixed or reduced costs sought cheaper options for carrying out litigation.
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Regulators were happy to approve or at least look away while such practices developed. One problem with Mazur was that the Solicitors Regulation Authority had erroneously told a firm that its employees were permitted to undertake reserved legal activities. The lack of any public statement from the SRA for two weeks – despite having intervened in the case itself – suggests an organisation lacking both accountability and clarity.
Then there is CILEX, which for years continued to tell its members they could conduct litigation if employed in solicitor firms. Practising certificate fees continued to be collected while this fundamental error was allowed to percolate among the legal executive community, not to mention the fees charged for litigation qualifications that may prove worthless. Expect calls for refunds and apologies to continue to be made, with CILEX struggling to summon reasons to reject either.
The LSA has also dated quickly in terms of the reality of working in law firms. Legal executives are not second-class citizens but valued and sometimes the most experienced members of the team.
The profession may struggle in the coming weeks to know how best to respond to the regulatory and financial challenges this ruling presents. The tag of ‘unqualified’ is likely to surface, with unfortunate and unfair connotations. But a unified response should be universal: this is not the time for pitting solicitors and legal executives against each other.
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