Last 3 months headlines – Page 1593
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Rhymes and misdemeanours
The Gazette continues to atone for the sin of describing conveyancing and probate as ‘prosaic’ by featuring your poems on said disciplines. This week probate solicitor Elainne Lawrie, late of collapsed Wirral firm Lees Lloyd Whitley, on ‘dealing with the deceased’: ...
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Knock knock
The annual conference of the Legal Aid Practitioners Group (LAPG) may seem an unlikely setting for joviality given the situation endured by many in the face of continued fee cuts. But, you’ve got to laugh, as they say. And Obiter was pleased to see this was something even the legal ...
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Memory lane
Clarence Darrow, a famous American attorney once spoke for twelve hours and a letter concerning discrimination against female articled clerks. Law Society’s Gazette, October 1959 ...
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An online legal information resource will provide a clear advantage
Take the slow train out of Leeds and head west, past Halifax. Just before you leave Yorkshire for Lancashire, you’ll find a picturesque village called Mytholmroyd – which you should pronounce like thyroid, not mistletoe. Climb the steep hill by the Methodist chapel, walk past ...
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Commitment to human rights must be preserved through next general election
By John Wadham, the legal director of the Equality and Human Rights Commission As we hurtle towards a general election, the time is ripe to reflect on the attitudes of the major parties to human rights. In July 2007 the government announced that it would ...
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Legal aid budget crossroads?
The MoJ’s surprise announcement on Tuesday of a wide-ranging review of legal aid delivery must be interpreted as an implicit acknowledgement that the existing system is not fit for purpose. Many solicitors have being saying as much on the letters pages of the Gazette for as long as most of ...
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US firm could reap benefits of UK reforms with Lovells tie-up
US firm Hogan & Hartson has remained quiet on whether it might use a tie-up with City firm Lovells to access external capital in the future, following reports this week of a merger between the two firms. The merger could potentially give Hogan & Hartson access ...
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Bank paybacks cement plant upgrades
Payback time: US firm Shearman & Sterling advised French bank Société Générale on a €4.8bn (£4.4bn) rights issue. The bank will use most of the proceeds to repay the €3.4bn (£3.1bn) of emergency funding given to it by the French state.
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UN to help developing nations negotiate with western projects lawyers
Lawyers in developing countries could be given help when negotiating investment deals with City project lawyers under a UN initiative to bolster their bargaining power when human rights are at stake.
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Collaborative law a success for divorcing couples, says judge
Collaborative law has proved a huge success for divorcing couples and could soon be extended into the commercial arena, one of the UK’s most senior judges said last week. Lord Kerr of Tonaghmore, a justice of the Supreme Court, said the number of collaborative lawyers practising ...
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Surge in unfair dismissal claims puts tribunals under strain
Lawyers are witnessing a huge surge in unfair dismissal claims which is leading them to expand their employment teams but is also placing a severe strain on the tribunal system. Figures released by the Tribunals Service last week showed that unfair dismissal claims rose 29% to ...
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SRA commissions £40,000 diversity research
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has commissioned research to find out why ethnic minority solicitors are over-represented in its regulatory decisions, the Gazette has learned. The £40,000 study, by business psychologists Pearn Kandola, will look at issues including the SRA’s processes, the career progression of ethnic minority ...
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Joint LA panel to save £1.5m
Six London boroughs have combined to slash almost £1.5m a year in legal fees. The London Boroughs Legal Alliance, which links lawyers from Harrow, Hammersmith & Fulham, Camden, Hillingdon, Hounslow and Kensington & Chelsea councils, aims to save £1.44m through a pioneering collaboration.
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Legal process outsourcing is ‘here to stay’
Legal process outsourcing (LPO) is ‘here to stay’ and attracting interest from investors, a leading practitioner claimed last week. Mark Lewis, head of outsourcing at City firm Berwin Leighton Paisner, said there are ‘a number of private equity providers knocking around the City offering quite a ...
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SRA rules out lowering premiums in assigned risks pool
The Solicitors Compensation Fund looks set to receive a £5m boost to its reserves which could ease the financial pressure on individual firms, under plans being put forward at the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s board meeting today. However, in a separate development the SRA has concluded that ...
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MoJ review on separate budgets for criminal and civil legal aid
The Ministry of Justice has announced a review of the way the £2bn legal aid budget is delivered which could see separate civil and criminal funds run by different bodies. The review came as legal aid lawyers warned that firms providing social welfare work are at ...
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Mental illness – a death sentence in China
Acupuncture and herbal remedies – that’s what Chinese medicine means to most of us. But now the Beijing government has come up with a new form of medication. It’s a cure for bipolar disorder, it’s permanent and it takes just seconds to administer.
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Costly choice
In his Euro blog last week, Jonathan Goldsmith could barely hide his excitement following the judgment by the European Court of Justice in the Eschig case, in which it was held that a clause in an Austrian legal expenses policy did not in fact allow...
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Homme d’affaires
I suppose it is the function of influential thinktanks to take away one’s breath. The College of Law’s Legal Services Policy Institute (‘Scrap training contracts’, see [2009] Gazette, 24 September, 1) certainly does that. New entrants to the profession are overqualified? I don’t think so.
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Subjecting terror suspects to triple jeopardy is an affront to justice
by Dr Amir A Majid LLM DCLis a barrister and reader in law at London Metropolitan University. He is also a part-time immigration judge and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Islamic State Practices in International Law On 11 September, a judge at Woolwich Crown Court ...