All articles by Eduardo Reyes – Page 38
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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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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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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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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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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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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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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 ...
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Litigants in person numbers soar
The dire state of the economy has already led to a dramatic increase in the number of litigants in person, new figures from a voluntary organisation suggest. This is before government cuts to civil legal aid come into effect, which many solicitors predict will trigger another huge rise.
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Liam Fox finds his inner lawyer
Politicians, especially when in government, find lawyers and the law make good knocking copy. As my colleague John Hyde reported in a blog from the Conservative Party Conference, MP Ben Gummer was more colloquial than most in telling solicitors to ‘get real’ and stop ‘irresponsible’ opposition to government plans on ...
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Mansfield takes a stand on tuition fees
If elected chancellor of Cambridge University next week, human rights lawyer Michael Mansfield QC (pictured, centre) plans to adopt a vigorously interventionist approach to the role. Mansfield told the Gazette that government policy on admission fees ‘disregards our international [convention] obligations’ as well as ...
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What makes a reliable survey or piece of research?
Research studies and surveys of the legal sector have been a feature of business life for some time now - and any number can be expected in the run-up to, and beyond, the liberalisation of the legal services market. But can you trust the results of the surveys you read? ...
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Advising clients on compliance in UK-Swiss tax agreement will not be straightforward
The UK-Swiss tax agreement, announced last month, will be in force from 31 May 2013, and full details will only be made available as both countries sign it. But it is already clear that the existence of the agreement places legal advisers in a difficult position when advising their clients ...
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Vickers review puts lawyers centre stage
Banks’ legal and compliance departments are expected to grow with the implementation of reforms recommended this week by the Independent Commission on Banking, chaired by Sir John Vickers (pictured). The centre of power for corporate counsel will be located firmly on the retail side and ...
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Weak link between firms' growth and profits shown
Law firms with a turnover of more than £5m often struggle to turn further growth into greater profitability, according to benchmarking research seen by the ...
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Lessons for the law from bookshops
Going by comments made on the Gazette website, and letters to the editor, there are plenty of practitioners who see some of the changes in the legal landscape that we are told are in prospect as pointless, and who see no reason why a ‘brave new world’ is inevitable.
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News focus: Lord Justice Leveson's large remit
There has been a close focus in the press on the main actors in the judicial inquiry that David Cameron announced into the phone-hacking scandal on 20 July. The abilities of Lord Justice Leveson (pictured) and the panel of experts who will advise him do of course matter. As Joshua ...
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Advice for firms that find it harder to get PII cover at the right price
Market conditions have produced something of a ‘perfect storm’ around the October professional indemnity insurance (PII) renewals this year.
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Is the power of general counsel over-estimated?
Are law firms right to focus so much of their effort on relationships with general counsel? The question seems semi-heretical to me. For 10 years in-house lawyers were the main audience I wrote for, and I feel as though I have watched the sector grow in influence and respect, shaping ...