Last 3 months headlines – Page 1568

  • News

    Family solicitors report rise in 'collaborative prenups’

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Family solicitors have reported a rise in the number of clients asking for prenuptial agreements to be prepared using the collaborative law model. Suzanne Kingston, a partner at London firm Dawsons, said about 50% of the pre- and postnuptial agreements she completed last year were done ...

  • News

    LSC announces dates for civil legal aid tenders, but concerns remain

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    The Legal Services Commission has announced the revised dates that tendering for the new civil contracts for legal aid work will open, but the Law Society has warned that problems must still be addressed before the tenders begin. Bid rounds for social welfare law and ...

  • News

    Solicitor comparison wesite for legal fees

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    A new solicitor comparison website will allow consumers to compare law firm fees for the first time, the Gazette can reveal. CompareLegalSolutions.com, to be launched in March, claims it will allow consumers to compare firms on price across 90 areas of law.

  • News

    SRA poised to relax conflict of interest rules

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Law firms will be able to advise rival clients on the same deal after the Solicitors Regulation Authority laid down plans to relax conflict of interest and confidentiality rules in a shortened consultation which will close next month. The proposed rule changes being pushed through by ...

  • News

    Judgement call

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    I write in response to the letter from Shamil Purohit (7 January) headed ‘Wake up and smell the coffee’.

  • News

    Martial law

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    In response to Christopher Digby-Bell’s letter of 7 January, I quote field marshal von Moltke: ‘No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.’ Michael Timms, M R Timms & Company, Dudley

  • News

    Supply and demands

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Your editorial ‘Future in the balance’ (7 January) told us nothing new. There has always been an imbalance between those wanting to enter the profession and those for whom there is an opening.

  • News

    Jackson LJ on civil litigation costs – your views

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    I believe Lord Justice Jackson’s emphasis on before-the-event (BTE), and the removal of after-the-event and adverse success fees, is linked to the onset of the Legal Services Act (LSA) and the introduction of alternative business structures.

  • News

    How can we help make more commercially minded lawyers?

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    As a non-lawyer (I refuse to use the terms fee-earner and non fee-earner, or 'fee-burner' as I heard it called recently), I find it frustrating that many lawyers lack commercial awareness, that is the ability and desire to really talk to clients...

  • News

    What is the real motive behind defamation costs reform?

    2010-01-21T00:00:00Z

    Lord Justice Jackson published his review on civil costs on 14 January, recommending the abolition of success fees and after-the-event insurance in all civil cases where conditional fee agreements (CFAs) were used.

  • News

    xdb

    2010-01-20T00:00:00Z

    All cats are black after midnight

  • News

    Straw to crack down on lawyers’ defamation fees

    2010-01-20T00:00:00Z

    The Ministry of Justice has launched a four-week consultation proposing an ‘urgent’ interim measure to limit the success fees that can be claimed by lawyers in defamation cases. The consultation paper proposes limiting the uplift charged by lawyers for winning defamation cases taken on under conditional ...

  • News

    In two minds about schizophrenia?

    2010-01-20T00:00:00Z

    Our society has an ambivalent attitude to schizophrenia, as a cursory search of the news for the first half of January 2010 makes abundantly clear.

  • News

    Tax lawyers report rise in tribunal appeals work

    2010-01-20T00:00:00Z

    Tax litigation lawyers have seen a 14% increase in tribunal cases as a result of more aggressive tax collection by HM Revenue & Customs. A report by accountants UHY Hacker Young found that tax tribunals cases grew from 4,311 in 2007 to 4,897 in 2008, with ...

  • News

    Echoing Lord Justice Jackson on alternative dispute resolution

    2010-01-18T00:00:00Z

    Here is one of the big issues facing the EU: how do you successfully communicate laws and policies to more than 500 million citizens in 23 official languages?

  • News

    MPs warn of criminal justice 'crisis'

    2010-01-18T00:00:00Z

    A committee of MPs has warned that the criminal justice system is ‘facing a crisis of sustainability’ as government spending on prisons takes resources away from other aspects of criminal justice. The Justice Committee said the government should make ‘radical moves’ to shift resources away from ...

  • News

    YouGov survey sheds light on professional services

    2010-01-15T00:00:00Z

    With an hour to kill at the dentist on Monday, with my son in the hot seat, I took along a little light reading – the recent YouGov survey results published on behalf of the Legal Services Board.

  • News

    Criminal law – extending the jurisdiction of the magistrates’ courts

    2010-01-14T00:00:00Z

    For hearings on or after 30 September 2009, significant amendments have been made to the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 by section 17 of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004.

  • News

    Criminal procedure

    2010-01-14T00:00:00Z

    Bail – Credit for time served – Electric monitoring – Sentencing R v Rudie Aaron Monaghan: R v Robert Douglas Tyler: R v Chay Gilbert: R v Asim Naser: R v Aquib Khan: R v Ben Chapman: CA ...

  • News

    Coroners

    2010-01-14T00:00:00Z

    Coroners’ courts – Death in custody – Inquests R (on the application of Keith Lewis) (appellant) v HM Coroner for the Mid and North Division of the County of Shropshire (respondent) and Secretary of State for Justice (interested ...