Last 3 months headlines – Page 1743

  • News

    Pll providers shun small firms

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    Small firms renewing their professional indemnity insurance (PII) cover will be further squeezed in an already hardening market after insurers Norwich Union and Liberty cut policies for these practices. Norwich Union, which controls 8.3% of the legal PII market, has stopped offering new cover to firms ...

  • News

    'Firms favour UK trainees'

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    City University’s law school is telling international students on its law masters programmes to apply for jobs with US firms or go in-house because recruitment practices at English firms favour UK candidates, the Gazette can reveal. Professor Alan Riley, director of the LLM programme at City ...

  • News

    Registry fraud payouts soar

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    The Land Registry is facing a compensation bill up by £5 million on last year because of an increase in fraudulent title registrations. Figures in its annual report, published in August, show the value of claims pending for losses resulting from errors on the register caused ...

  • News

    Rhys Jones fee row threatens trial delay

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    The solicitor representing the defendant charged with murdering Liverpool schoolboy Rhys Jones has launched judicial review proceedings against the Legal Services Commission (LSC), claiming that the trial has been wrongly classified as a very high cost case (VHCC). Seven defendants are due to go on trial ...

  • News

    Thumbs-up for mediation pilot

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    Employment lawyers have given the thumbs-up to a judicial mediation pilot and called for it to be available in tribunals across England and Wales. Results of a survey carried out by the Employment Lawyers Association (ELA) revealed that the majority (78%) of the 123 respondents who ...

  • News

    SRA advocacy plans slammed

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) proposals to introduce a scheme of voluntary accreditation for solicitor higher court advocates could lead to ‘incompetent solicitors’ appearing in court, the College of Law’s Legal Services Policy Institute has claimed. The institute called instead for mandatory assessment and compulsory accreditation in ...

  • News

    Herbert Smith targets lawyers on career break

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    City firm Herbert Smith is planning to tempt lawyers on a career break to join the firm as part of a recruitment drive. In conjunction with executive search consultancy Sapphire Partners, the firm will host a ‘back to practice’ workshop at its London offices in September, ...

  • News

    Pension deal

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    City firm LG advised Universities Superannuation Scheme – the pension scheme for academic staff in the UK, and the second largest fund in the country – on purchasing a 50% share in an investment property portfolio joint venture with Tesco. City firm Berwin Leighton Paisner advised Tesco.

  • News

    Time to shop around?

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    The ‘cheapest’ products vary hugely between price comparison sites. News that Moneysupermarket.com plans to add legal business to its online offering is a further landmark on the road to widespread commoditisation of the sector. ‘This is what 21st century, internet-driven consumerism looks ...

  • News

    Keeping errers in cheque

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    Lawyers must take the time to proofread their letters to clients or potentially risk looking incompetent, says Martin Cutts. Attention to grammar, punctuation and the meaning of words has long been claimed as a hallmark of lawyers.

  • News

    Distant lands, close friends

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    Major conferences in the US and Canada showed the importance of exporting legal services. I recently had a whistle-stop tour of New York and Quebec, representing the Law Society at the annual meeting of the American Bar Association (ABA) and the Canadian Bar Association’s (CBA) ...

  • News

    Data page

    2008-09-04T00:00:00Z

    The data page is financial rates and data compiled for the Law Gazette by the Moneyfacts Group, the UK's largest supplier of savings and mortgage data Downloads Download the data page below. ...

  • News

    Plan of action

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    An assessment of Whitehall’s latest attempt to reform planning law, which features a controversial ‘one-stop-shop’ consent regime After several years wrestling with the question of developing a suitable regime to speed up the delivery of major infrastructure, the government has finally brought forward its proposals ...

  • News

    Plaques, suicides & dangerous doors

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    It is often said that there is ‘no law’ in personal injury work. But in the space of nine months the law Lords have delivered four judgments of profound importance. I have previously dealt with their important limitation decision in A v Hoare [2008] UKHL 6. In this article, I ...

  • News

    Costs

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    Legal profession – Instructions – Retainers – Solicitor and client costs Richard Buxton (solicitors) v Huw Llewelyn Paul Mills-Owens: QBD (Mr Justice Mackay, Master Simons, Martin Cockx, sitting as an assessor): 28 July 2008 ...

  • News

    Landlord and tenant

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    Human rights – Local government – Caravan sites – Gypsies – Possession claims – Travellers William Doherty & Ors (appellant) v Birmingham City Council (respondent) & Secretary of State for Communities & Local Government (intervener): HL (Lords Hope ...

  • News

    Tax

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    Capital allowances – Corporation tax – Industrial buildings allowance - Warehouse Revenue & Customs Commissioners v Maco Door & Window Hardware (UK) Ltd: HL (Lords Hoffmann, Scott of Foscote, Walker of Gestingthorpe, Mance, Neuberger of Abbotsbury): 30 July 2008 ...

  • News

    Arbitration

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    Conflict of laws – International law – Attachment orders – Expropriation – Freezing injunctions E.T.I. Euro Telecom International NV v (1) Bolivia (2) Empresa Nacional De Telecomunicaciones Entel SA CA: (Civ Div) (Lords Justice Tuckey, Lawrence Collins, Stanley ...

  • News

    Wine column: best of British

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    In the mid-1970s Monty Python ran an Australian wine-tasting sketch with the punchline ‘bring your own bottle’. The studio audience cried with laughter. With names such as Kanga Rouge and Wallaby White just starting to appear on the British High Street, it was little wonder that its then fledgling wine ...

  • News

    Setting up shop: building a new family practice

    2008-08-21T00:00:00Z

    Lawyers need to be more like entrepreneurs – that was the message legal business guru Professor Stephen Mayson gave during his speech at the Law London 2008 event. And there cannot be anything much more entrepreneurial for a solicitor to do than setting up their own firm. ...