Last 3 months headlines – Page 1529
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Profits up, income down at Shoosmiths and MMS
National firm Shoosmiths today reported a 70% jump in average profits per equity partner (PEP), despite a 9% fall in revenues. PEP rose to £256,000 in 2009/10, up from £150,000 in the previous 12 months, but still well down on the £372,000 recorded in 2007/08. ...
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Scrapping regulation reform for private landlords shows no foresight
by Debra Wilsonpartner at Anthony Gold and a member of the Law Society housing law committee In his first speech as housing minister, Grant Shapps announced that the government was scrapping recommendations to further regulate the private rented sector. He said further regulation would ‘create burdensome ...
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Legal aid is under threat across Europe and it is time to fight to save it
Let’s be honest. You are not going to plough your way through the 657 pages of the newly published Effective Criminal Defence in Europe, nor even the more accessible 30-page summary. However, you should know what you have missed. These reports have important lessons relevant to the upcoming battle for ...
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Research casts doubt on notion ABSs will trigger mass closures
One day, an enterprising author will write a novel after James Herriot, chronicling the exploits of a peripatetic solicitor travelling up hill and down dale to visit immobile clients in all weathers. A fanciful notion, perhaps – but Oxera’s report for the Law Society about the impact of ABSs on ...
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Chancery Lane launches new studies on paralegals and solicitor-advocates
The Law Society has commissioned former Ministry of Justice senior civil servant Nick Smedley (pictured) to produce research papers on paralegal qualifications and on improved support for solicitor-advocates. Smedley’s first paper will be a ‘scoping study’ into whether the Law Society should develop or endorse qualifications ...
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Oil refinery, sugar, supermarkets and TV entertainment
Comedy collection: City firm Olswang advised Elisabeth Murdoch’s TV production company Shine on acquiring comedy TV producer Brown Eyed Boy, which claims to have discovered comedian Sacha Baron Cohen (pictured), from media investment company Motive Television, advised by southcoast firm Moore Blatch, and ...
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Companies ‘complacent’ on anti-corruption measures
Companies have failed to invest in anti-corruption schemes ahead of legislation that will punish domestic and foreign bribery, research has shown. More than three-quarters of companies have not invested any money in anti-corruption strategies, and only 12% have spent more than £500 on preparing for the ...
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Councils merge two legal teams
Two London councils are to merge their legal teams under a joint head of legal services in a bid to cut external legal spend and staff costs. In a six-month trial, Merton’s head of legal Helen White will also become head of legal at Richmond ...
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Legal aid firms suffer LSC payment blow
The Legal Services Commission has dealt a further blow to legal aid firms by reducing the financial help it gives to firms while they wait for their bills to be paid by the commission. The LSC said it has had to reduce the amount of ...
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Identity theft victim warns solicitors of conveyancing scam
A solicitor whose firm has been the victim of identity theft has warned lawyers not to be caught out by a scam in which a bogus conveyancer has been using her firm’s name to carry out property transactions. Saydia Iqbal, a partner at Bolton firm SK ...
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KBP taken over by financial services mutual Wesleyan
The company that rose from the ashes of legal lender Key Business Finance (KBF), which collapsed amid the 2008 banking crisis, has been taken over by financial services mutual Wesleyan. KBF supplied nearly 15% of law firms in England and Wales with short-term loans before it ...
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Duty rota system in ‘chaos’
The police station duty rotas issued last week by the Legal Services Commission will run for only three months due to problems with the allocation process, which lawyers claim has ‘descended into chaos’. The Legal Services Commission has twice reissued the rotas for police station duty ...
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CPS damages claim saga rumbles on
A judge has with a ‘heavy heart’ allowed the Crown Prosecution Service to continue defending an employment tribunal claim that has already been in court four times and cost the taxpayer more than £1m, including a record £600,000 in damages for racial discrimination. Former CPS prosecutor ...
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Family lawyers left ‘in limbo’ by LSC
Legal aid lawyers have been ‘left in limbo’ by the Legal Services Commission’s continuing failure to announce the outcome of the family and social welfare tenders, practitioners said this week. Firms were originally due to find out the results of the bidding exercise last month, but ...
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Government plans Defamation Bill
Media lawyers have given a mixed response to the government’s announcement that it is to publish a draft Defamation Bill in the new year. Justice minister Lord McNally outlined the government’s plans to review the law on defamation to protect freedom of speech and expression during ...
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Big four buoy partner profits in face of declining revenues
The UK’s quartet of billion-pound law firms have maintained healthy profits per equity partner (PEP) in the face of declining revenues, their financial results have shown. Industry observers said the firms had adopted a sensible strategy of cutting partners to bolster average partner earnings, enabling them ...
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Small firms will be ‘resilient’ in the face of ABSs
Small law firms are likely to be ‘resilient’ to the impact of alternative business structures, research has suggested. A report by consultants Oxera, commissioned by the Law Society, also concluded that ABSs are unlikely to be detrimental to geographic access to justice for consumers. ...
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ABI demands tougher indemnity terms
Insurers must be given better access to solicitors’ disciplinary histories before granting them indemnity cover, the Association of British Insurers (ABI) said this week. Outlining proposals for reform of the professional indemnity insurance (PII) market submitted to the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the ABI said insurers want ...
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Simon Young
Council members and staff at the Law Society were greatly saddened to learn of the untimely death on 3 July of former council member Simon Young. Simon was elected to the council in 2001 to represent the Society’s Law Management Section, which he did for ...
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Could the ‘Freemium’ model work in legal services?
Twenty-first-century businesses are making vast sums of money by charging their customers nothing. This is the paradox at the heart of Chris Anderson’s new book Free, the Future of a Radical Price, which argues that new technologies are causing production and distribution costs to plummet.