All articles by Eduardo Reyes – Page 36
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News
Should surplus lawyers sue?
In New York suits have been filed against 14 law schools on behalf of alumni who have been unable to start the legal career they had set their hearts on. It would be easy to sneer at what looks, from a certain angle, like the plaintiffs’ ...
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Can the Fiji government’s sensitivities be exploited?
When it comes to the topic of their legality, dictators are a surprisingly needy bunch, and Fiji’s current rulers are no exception. Following the Gazette’s report on the rule of law (or lack thereof) in Fiji , its attorney general, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, and director of public prosecutions, New Zealander Christopher ...
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Fiji hits back at scathing report
Fiji’s attorney general has launched a personal attack on the author of a report which claimed to expose a serious deterioration in the rule of law in the country. Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum (pictured), the second most powerful member of Fiji’s government, described the report as a ‘joke’ ...
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Covert trip reveals rule of law ‘lost’ in Fiji
A secret fact-finding mission to Fiji has concluded that the rule of law ‘no longer operates’ in the country. The independence of the judiciary ‘cannot be relied upon’ and ‘there is no freedom of expression’, council member and Law Society Charity chair Nigel Dodds reports in Fiji: The Rule of ...
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Survey: in-house woe for magic circle
Pressure on corporate legal budgets eased in 2011, but that failed to halt a three-year decline in the use of magic circle firms. Legal departments instead chose to increase their own headcount, and to make greater use of UK mid-tier law firms, other international firms, the bar and niche firms.
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BT Claims has taken part of the market by surprise
I thought the news that a BT subsidiary has applied to become an alternative business structure (ABS) was the most interesting so far in what is predicted to be a year of unprecedented change in the legal profession. Sure, it’s interesting that private equity money is ...
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Morale low among Ministry of Justice staff
Evidence of poor morale among staff at the Ministry of Justice has emerged from the civil service’s annual ‘people survey’. Among its findings is that staff at the ministry and its agencies have no confidence in decisions made by senior managers. Only 32% of respondents would recommend the MoJ as ...
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Business specialist launches franchise scheme
A south-east law firm which has won awards for its innovative approach to business advice has used its name to launch a new franchise. Acumen Business Law, based in Hove, East Sussex, will license firms to use the name Acumen Business Law Enterprise. Acumen’s managing ...
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Lib Dem votes on legal aid
The House of Lords is now debating amendments to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill in the shadow of a government defeat on key proposals for welfare reform. While we are right to focus a lot of attention on the strength and ...
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Commission's conclusions should return assisted dying debate to moral realms
by Eduardo Reyes, Gazette features editor The report on assisted dying, produced by a ‘commission’ formed by thinktank Demos, and part-funded by author and campaigner Terry Pratchett, made headlines last week for stating that there were practical ways that the existing law on suicide could be ...
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Choosing death
A report on assisted dying, produced by a ‘commission’ formed by think tank Demos, makes big headlines today. The commission, whose year of hearings and evidence gathering was chaired by former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer, has no official status. But, by its composition, the commission has done its best to ...
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Lord Falconer slams assisted dying law
A thinktank led by former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer (pictured) has called the law on assisted dying ‘inadequate and incoherent’. In a report published today, the Commission on Assisted Dying concludes that the law can be reformed without endangering protections for vulnerable people. The report’s ...
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Corporate clients open to instructing ABSs
General counsel in FTSE 350 companies are overwhelmingly open to the idea of instructing law firms that are externally owned. According to research based on replies from 51 businesses, 90% of general counsel said they ‘definitely would’ or ‘probably would’ purchase legal services from a firm which took external ownership. ...
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Role of solicitors' charity is more important than ever
Two key charities that support solicitors and their dependants have seen their workload increase significantly as a troubled economy continues to place strain on the finances and private lives of many lawyers. The number of enquiries for support received each month by SBA The Solicitors’ Charity (formerly the Solicitors Benevolent ...
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PI lawyers risk conflict claims under ABS
The legal profession is unprepared for conflicts of interest in personal injury law that will occur from 2012, the Gazette has been told. Such conflicts could leave PI lawyers open to negligence claims and increase professional indemnity insurance premiums. The problem arises from the willingness ...
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News focus: Vince Cable’s employment law ‘bonfire’
Business secretary Vince Cable’s speech announcing ‘radical reform to the employment law system’ reads oddly. It contains contradictions of the sort that do not usually make it into the final draft of a minister’s speech.
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ABS ‘threat’ to in-house legal teams
In-house legal teams will be vulnerable to replacement by services run by outsourcing businesses, such as Capita and Serco, once the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) is able to license alternative business structures (ABSs).
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Open all hours
Anyone who’s taken time out to read my recent Gazette features will know that I’ve received many pieces of legal services and legal market surveys and research down the years. Sometimes they impress, and sometimes they don’t - and unlike restaurant critics who haven’t worked ...
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Human rights, words and lawyers
Last Saturday I attended part of the ‘Fairness, Justice and Human Rights’ conference, which was organised by the University of Essex Human Rights Centre, the Law Society and others. I was struck by a phrase used in passing by one speaker, who referred to the United ...
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Are solicitors really living through the ‘end times’ for law as they have known it?
In his memoir Editor, journalist and author Max Hastings mused on the difference, as he saw it, between readers of the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph. Mail readers, he observed, woke every morning and opened their paper of choice to find that the world had altered irretrievably for the ...