Last 3 months headlines – Page 1698
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Logo bill is a sign of the times
Late last year [2008, Gazette, 20 November, 3], the Lord Chancellor’s Department revealed the logo for the new Supreme Court. Readers with an interest in heraldry will recall its emblematic depiction of the UK’s three jurisdictions embraced by a symbol representing both Libra and omega. Now the Tories’ Dominic Grieve ...
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Journalists in family courts
At a rough guess, of the 150-odd people who packed out Chancery Lane’s reading room last night to discuss the Ministry of Justice’s plans to admit journalists into family courts, 149 think it a bad idea. And the one who is in principle in favour (me) has strong reservations about ...
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Professional managers must be accepted into law firms, and fast
Given that the Code of Conduct now requires law firms to have in place a proper management structure, how well is this really being accepted? And how well is this being implemented?
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The state we’re in
So there you have it. MPs have voted in favour of holding some inquests in secret, after a string of heavily spun ‘concessions’ from the government. This is either another nail in the coffin of a free society or a matter of supreme indifference to all but a self-selecting cadre ...
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Does your firm need a viral ad?
I knew the Arctic Monkeys had gone utterly mainstream the morning I heard a package on their success via online word-of-mouth marketing on Radio 4’s Today programme.
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Show us the proof government can handle our data legally
A study commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Reform trust has lobbed a legal hand grenade into the government’s stated ambition to look after us better with the help of bigger and more joined up computer databases. According to the report, the Database State, nearly a quarter of the government’s biggest ...
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Calm down dear, it’s only a new world of conversations
It seems that so far our brave new world for the Gazette, of blogging and user commenting, is working a treat – our visitor numbers are up and people are reading for longer and seeing more pages when they turn up.
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Let Lord Laming have his way
Surely it should be obvious that if you put up the cost of something you put people off buying it? Economists see this as the absolute basis of economics – the use of incentives to deter and encourage. How Whitehall, then, thought making child care cases up to 2,500% more ...
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Baker & McKenzie to cut staff in London
US firm Baker & McKenzie is to axe up to 85 staff in London, including between 20 and 30 lawyers, as part of a new redundancy consultation. The firm is also anticipating a pay freeze and scrapping its all-staff bonus. Gary Senior, London managing partner, ...
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Don't overreact to downturn, says professional services group
Law firms operating in the UK will fall behind firms in foreign markets unless specific regulatory burdens are lifted, according to government officials and law firm chiefs. In its first report, submitted to Chancellor Alistair Darling this week, the Professional Services Global Competitiveness Group (PSGC) ...
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Chancery Lane seeks tax concession
The Law Society has warned that taxing law firms on work they have yet to be paid for could result in small practices getting into financial trouble. President Paul Marsh has written to HM Revenue & Customs asking the authority to suspend the UITF 40 ...
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Free movement of people and adopting EU provisions
To be free or not to be – that is the question for the UK government as it continues to struggle to implement the free movement of people provision, some 50 years after the establishment of the EU.
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Family law
Care – Children – Committal for contempt – Penal notices Re PB (children) sub nom a local authority v (1) HP (2) MB: CA (Civ Div) (Lords Justice Thorpe, Wall, Moore-Bick): 27 February 2009 ...
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Insolvency
Data protection – Serious fraud cases – Transfer of data in the public interest In the matter of Madoff Securities International Ltd: ChD (Mr Justice Lewison): 27 February 2009
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Manchester is making the most of the recession
Manchester University recently lost to an Oxford college in a hard-fought final of University Challenge, but there was a silver lining; the result was overturned after one of the Oxford ‘students’ was discovered to be a trainee accountant. The city’s legal market is experiencing equally mixed fortunes. Like everywhere else ...
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Stifling information damages democracy
Sarah Webb is wrong to say there is no problem with costs in publication proceedings (see [2009] Gazette, 5 March, 10).
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Jack Straw and legal aid
Let us be grateful to the lord chancellor at least for his frank warning that lawyers dependent on state funding would be ‘wise to reconsider’ their expectations of earnings (see [2009] Gazette, 12 March, 1).
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Constructive dialogue
I write in response to the comments made by Richard Charlton about the fixed fees that apply to legally aided mental health work (see [2009] Gazette, 5 March, 14-15).
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Fixed fees fall-out
The current proposals from the Legal Services Commission in relation to fixed fees for family cases are likely to have an adverse effect on children, families and the administration of justice.