Last 3 months headlines – Page 1614
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Charities are right to recover losses
I was disappointed to read Michael Loveridge’s response to my comments about executors potentially being liable to beneficiaries for losses caused by delay (see [2009] Gazette, 2 July, 10). I hope he will not carry through his suggestion of advising his clients against making charitable bequests.
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Enforcing contact to benefit children, not punish the parents
Do not think that the amendments to the Children Act (CA) relating to contact orders made by the Children and Adoption Act 2006 (the 2006 act), with effect from 8 December 2008, are about punishing parents for failing to comply with contact orders. Rather, the reforms are to ensure that ...
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Freedom of information: exemptions from disclosure
Freedom of information has been at the heart of the news agenda with the revelations made by the Daily Telegraph about MPs’ expenses. It’s worth remembering that, while the Telegraph came by the leaked information from someone in the House of Commons fees office...
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Does environmental law have built-in growth potential?
With work expected to increase in planning, renewable energy and climate change, is environmental law a specialism with growth build-in? With the government hoping to kick-start a ‘green recovery’, so that the UK emerges from the recession as a low-carbon economy, environmental law remains high on ...
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Legal aid Live Aid
We know times are hard for lawyers, but it comes to something when they have to turn to busking to make a living. Two tuneful solicitors, Denis Cameron and Basil Preuveneers, plan to do just that this autumn – not because they are actually strapped ...
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Bubble rap
More plinth action from solicitors this week. Following last week’s revelation that Norfolk’s answer to The King, litigator Mark Fitch, is to perform an Elvis impersonation on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth today at 8pm, Obiter has learned of another lawyer limbering up for a stint as part of artist Antony ...
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Chasing an M&A deal?
If any readers find themselves in urgent need of a City lawyer this evening, they may find the phone is ringing out to an empty office. It seems that more or less the whole of the City branch of the profession will be taking part in the 5km Standard Chartered ...
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Memory lane
Anger toward a growing practice of incorrect photocopying and distribution. Advertisement listing character requirements for a television lawyer. The Law Society’s Gazette, July 1969 I feel I cannot ...
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Coming off the rails
If the government and LSC want to assess the risks of best value tendering, they should consider the collapse of the National Express East Coast train franchise. That company obtained the franchise with the lowest bid and an offer to make the biggest payment to the government.
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CPD a better tool
I have never thought that peer review was an appropriate quality assurance tool. It is an appropriate tool to assess how a solicitor and a firm conduct cases if there are concerns expressed by clients or colleagues.
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Tailored approach
I write with reference to the letters from Charlotte Collier and Graeme Hydari (see [2009] Gazette, 2 July, 9).
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Setting the standard
I write with reference to the article by Catherine Baksi on the LSC’s proposed change of approach to quality assurance (‘LSC to abandon peer review’, [2009] Gazette, 9 July, 1).
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Homelessness – when is enough, enough?
On 1 July the House of Lords handed down a single judgment in two housing appeals, which will have significant long-term consequences with a number of questions left unanswered.
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Two landmark reports demonstrate the complexity of human rights
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has just published the 200-page report of its Human Rights Inquiry. Meanwhile, rather more economically, Public Interest Lawyers (PIL) has put out its study – British forces in Iraq: the emerging picture of human rights violations and the role of the judicial review. ...
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Opportunity knocks for the bar to work with solicitors
With legal aid rates squeezed and the ‘threat’ of increased competition from the CPS and solicitor higher court advocates, the bar ought to be looking keenly at survival strategies. It is surprising, therefore, that the bar has been so slow either to seize the opportunities presented ...
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Compensation fund levy set for steep increase
The Law Society’s Council convenes next week to set the level of the compensation fund levy, with a steep increase on this year’s £150 now seemingly inevitable. A report circulated ahead of Wednesday’s meeting contains a recommendation from the Financial Protection Committee that the full contribution rate for 2009/10 be ...
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Legal Services Ombudsman criticises performance of regulator and complaints body
The Legal Services Ombudsman (LSO) has praised the work of her own department in her annual report, but criticised the performance of both the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Legal Complaints Service. Zahida Manzoor (pictured) said her own department ‘has again performed to a very high ...
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Conveyancers asked to sign up to combined Santander panel
Conveyancing firms on the former Abbey and Alliance & Leicester (A&L) panels are being asked to sign up to a combined Santander UK panel with new terms and conditions. Following negotiations with the Law Society, a letter is being sent initially to all solicitors on the ...
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Archbishop Desmond Tutu praises ‘vital role’ of volunteer lawyers
Lawyers who volunteer for development projects have ‘demolished the stereotype of lawyers being money-grabbing’, Archbishop Desmond Tutu (pictured, left, with attorney general Baroness Scotland, right) said this week. Speaking at an event organised by legal charity Advocates for International Development, he praised the legal profession’s work in providing free assistance ...