Last 3 months headlines – Page 1334

  • News

    Firm leaves Conveyancing Quality Scheme

    2012-01-23T00:00:00Z

    A Manchester firm has withdrawn from the Law Society’s Conveyancing Quality Scheme (CQS) after going into the insurance assigned risks pool (ARP). GLP Crumpsall is the first firm to leave the accreditation scheme, which opened in January 2011. It withdrew voluntarily after informing the ...

  • News

    Data delinquents and the money-go-round

    2012-01-23T00:00:00Z

    You know the ritual. A laptop computer, smartphone or memory stick goes missing and, a few weeks or months later, some shamefaced public body admits that the device contained sensitive personal data. Over the past year, however, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has started getting ...

  • News

    Jailing of internet contempt juror sends ‘important message’ - Grieve

    2012-01-23T00:00:00Z

    A juror who carried out internet research on a defendant has been jailed for six months. The Divisional Court, headed by the lord chief justice Lord Judge, today found university lecturer Theodora Dallas (pictured) guilty of contempt of court, following a case brought by the attorney ...

  • News

    Kudos to trainee minimum wage

    2012-01-21T00:00:00Z

    I’d like to say I became a journalist through a lifelong obsession with Woodward and Bernstein, a duty to inform and passion for the English language. In truth my career path probably owes more to a computer program named Kudos, which filtered your hobbies and dislikes to find your perfect ...

  • News

    Society contacts Cable over HSBC as Nationwide culls 'dormant' firms

    2012-01-20T00:00:00Z

    The Law Society has today written an open letter to solicitors outlining its strategy and guidance for addressing HSBC’s highly controversial decision to introduce a conveyancing panel comprising just 43 firms. President John Wotton has already complained to business secretary Vince Cable, while talks took place on Wednesday this week ...

  • News

    Jackson urges caution over contingency fee cap

    2012-01-20T00:00:00Z

    Lord Justice Jackson yesterday urged caution over setting limits on the percentage of damages that lawyers will be able to take in commercial cases under his reforms. The Court of Appeal judge also acknowledged that his wide-ranging changes to civil justice may not come into force ...

  • News

    Pinsent Masons in Anglo-Scottish merger talks

    2012-01-20T00:00:00Z

    Top 20 London firm Pinsent Masons has confirmed it is in cross-border merger talks with Edinburgh-based McGrigors. If successful, the merger would create a business with a turnover of more than £300m, headquartered in London and with six offices across Asia. In ...

  • News

    City solicitor jailed for perverting the course of justice

    2012-01-20T00:00:00Z

    A former partner of City firm Macfarlanes who claimed he was the victim of a kidnap to avoid being arrested for drink driving was today sentenced to 12 months in prison. Francis Bridgeman, 43, from Wards Lane, Wadhurst, East Sussex, was found guilty of perverting the ...

  • News

    Reprieve on special needs is first concession on legal aid bill

    2012-01-20T00:00:00Z

    The government has made its first tiny concession in the House of Lords debate on proposed legal aid reforms, agreeing to table a ‘technical amendment’ to ensure all special educational needs (SEN) cases remain in scope. But justice minister Lord McNally gave little hope that ...

  • News

    Human rights

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Prison - Prisoner - Management and treatment of prisoners Grant and another v Ministry of Justice: Queen's Bench Division (Mr Justice Hickinbottom): 19 December 2011 The Queen's Bench Division dismissed ...

  • News

    Company

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Shares - Agreement for sale - First claimant seeking summary judgment R.G.I International Ltd and another company v Synergy Classic Ltd: Queen's Bench Division, Commercial Court (Mr Justice Hamblen): 19 December 2011 ...

  • News

    Injunctions

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Practice - Pre-trial or post judgment relief - Freezing order Parbulk II AS v PT Humpuss Intermoda Transportasi TBK and other companies: Queen's Bench Division, Commercial Court (Mr Justice Gloster): 30 November 2011 ...

  • News

    Injunctions

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Practice - Appeal - Permission to appeal Hutcheson (formerly known as WER) v Popdog Ltd (formerly known as REW): Court of Appeal, Civil Division (Lord Neuberger, Lord Justices Etherton and Gross): 19 December 2011 ...

  • News

    Injunctions

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Practice - Appeal - Permission to appeal Hutcheson (formerly known as WER) v Popdog Ltd (formerly known as REW): Court of Appeal, Civil Division (Lord Neuberger, Lord Justices Etherton and Gross): 19 December 2011 ...

  • News

    PIN point a solution

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    I read with interest the letters from Edward Foster and CJA Cope regarding ‘the point’ of mediation. Cope ‘fails to understand how mediation can resolve a dispute which involves interpretation of [an] agreement’.

  • News

    Professional service

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Geyve Walker claims to inhabit ‘the hard world of commerce’. When I became a solicitor, like Franklin Sinclair, it was into a profession and not a business that I stumbled. A professional person has a number of motivations, two of which are service and compassion. ...

  • News

    In our interests

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Franklin Sinclair in the letter ‘Zero Support’ has only himself to blame. There is no purpose in having unprintable feelings or shouting about ‘outrage’ when the solution is in his own hands. The moral is: don’t do work if there is no possibility of payment. You ...

  • News

    Doomed to fail

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Institutional memory in the Crown Prosecution Service is notoriously short. Many years ago, when I ran a CPS branch, some genius at CPS HQ had the same idea of a paperless office. Two bright young things visited me uttering the dreadful words ‘pilot scheme’. ...

  • News

    Tax

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    Assessment - Appeal - Revenue and Customs Commissioners re-assessing taxpayer Revenue and Customs Commissioners v Lansdowne Partners Ltd Partnership: Court of Appeal, Civil Division (Sir Andrew Morritt, Lord Justices Moses and Patten): 20 December 2011 ...

  • News

    Dirty laundry

    2012-01-19T00:00:00Z

    I cannot be the only practising solicitor who finds the various and vastly different money laundering requirements within the financial industry to be utter nonsense. In one particular estate, I am one of three executors. The other two are my senior partner and a long-standing client.