Last 3 months headlines – Page 1393
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Police ‘abusing’ bail rules
The police are abusing bail rules, the chairman of the Law Society’s criminal law committee has alleged. Richard Atkinson has called for evidence from solicitors of what he believes to be a worsening phenomenon. He said: ‘Practitioners have very real concerns that huge numbers of people ...
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EU law education programme launched
Some 700,000 of the EU’s estimated 1.4 million lawyers, prosecutors and judges will have received a week’s formal training in EU law by 2020, the European Commission (EC) announced last week. The EC said in a press statement that the aim is to equip legal practitioners ...
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Junior lawyers slam college over training contracts
The Junior Lawyers Division has angrily rejected College of Law claims that there will soon be more training contract vacancies than Legal Practice Course graduates to fill them. The college has been accused of ‘spinning’ the figures to make it appear that securing a training contract ...
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Olswang to pilot new training model targeting City firms
A groundbreaking solicitor training model has launched this week, targeting City law firms and in-house legal departments. The first non-legal services provider to be authorised by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to take on trainees, Acculaw claims it will cut costs and improve efficiency for firms looking ...
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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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Human rights
Police - Powers - Police containing protesters at demonstration R (on the application of Castle and others) v Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis: QBD (Admin) (Lord Justice Pitchford, Mr Justice Supperstone): 8 September 2011 ...
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Lib Dem dissenters told LASPO reforms will go ahead
The Law Society and Bar Council have urged Liberal Democrats to hold their party to account over the government’s reforms of legal aid and civil litigation costs. But Lib Dem peer and justice minister Lord McNally (pictured), who will pilot the legislation through the Lords, has signalled that compromise is ...
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Legal aid bill ‘contravenes UN convention’
The government’s plans to remove legal aid in private law family cases will place the UK in breach of its obligations under a United Nations convention to prevent discrimination against women, the Gazette has been told. Cris McCurley, partner and head of international family law at ...
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Medical accidents charity ponders judicial review bid
Opponents of the government’s Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill could launch another High Court challenge. Action against Medical Accidents (AvMA) will decide this week whether to seek a judicial review to counter the removal of legal aid for clinical negligence cases. ...
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Time for the SRA to rethink its policy of indiscriminate publication
In October 2009, the Gazette carried an article by me (tinyurl.com/63k79bj) in which I criticised the general policy of the Solicitors Regulation Authority to publish on its website the details of forthcoming disciplinary cases in the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.
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Government’s replacement for control orders has come under critical scrutiny
What’s the difference between a control order and a terrorism prevention and investigation measure? The current equivalent of house arrest has a succinct but sinister-sounding title; its forthcoming replacement, though more explicit, is destined to become a near-acronym (TPIM, pronounced ‘T-pim’) and does not lend itself to the creation of ...
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The number of training contracts has declined, but Acculaw offers another way into a tight market
There has been a predictably mixed reaction to the launch of new outsourced training provider Acculaw, a venture which could have a dramatic impact on training among City firms. One obvious response is to ponder why no one has thought of this before - or if they have, why the ...
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The City can capitalise further on its reputation for legal services
by Stuart Popham, chairman of TheCityUK When I heard Kenneth Clarke say: ‘The City of London is a legal centre - not just a financial one,’ I raised a cheer.
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Building a rapport
The last two years or so have been a problematic time for conveyancers as the effects of the recession have seen a fall in transactions, a severe and continuing hardening of mortgage-lending availability and terms, and continuing problems for solicitors in securing access to lenders’ residential conveyancing panels.
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Jug your memory?
Obiter loves the Antiques Roadshow, though it is wonderfully disingenuous. Tweed-clad residents of the shires slyly profess to a fascination with ancient bric-a-brac, when all most of them are really interested in is whether their late auntie’s mysterious objet d’art is a hidden masterpiece that can be flogged to pay ...
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Law firms sign up to equal pay reporting
National firm Eversheds (pictured) and northwest firm DWF have become the country’s first law firms to join a government scheme to publish gender equality data. News that the two firms have signed up to the Home Office’s Think, Act, Report scheme follows a Legal Services Board ...
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Report card
The annual report of the Ministry of Justice is worth a good ferret, as there are always gobbets to be unearthed among the notes to the accounts. The nation’s magistrates might be concerned to note that HM Courts Service posted a massive £153m overspend, reflecting a newly discovered deficit in ...
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Ready to rock, paper, scissors
Kenneth Clarke is an impatient man, and not just when he’s waiting in the queue for the Commons canteen. The justice secretary wants cases to be wrapped up much quicker in the future – and we think we may have a solution for him right here ...
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‘Mad Fred’ Rondel
By the time I met Norbert ‘Mad Fred’ Rondel, the club owner acquitted of organising the robbery which led to the Spaghetti House siege in 1975, he was a relatively benign old man selling second-hand cars in Lambeth. Could I find him a computer to help with the resurrection of ...