Latest news – Page 758
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News
LSB to further probe value of quality schemes
The Legal Services Board is to seek further evidence to assess the usefulness of quality schemes for indicating whether law firms provide a good service to consumers, it revealed today. The LSB has asked its Legal Services Consumer Panel, the body that advises it on the ...
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US firms show strong rebound from economic woes
Uncertainty may still reign in the UK, but across the pond the legal sector is feeling rather more optimistic, research has suggested. A survey published today indicated that most law firms in the US are seeing revenues rise, partner numbers increase and an end to salary capping. Leaders of the ...
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Law firms ‘must improve practice management’
Business advisors have told law firms to improve their practice management if they want to emerge from the challenges of 2011. Members of the Institute for Turnaround (IFT) warned there are too many firms that are failing to recognise or deal with financial problems early enough. ...
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European Court opens up access to notary profession
The European Court of Justice has paved the way for UK solicitors to practise as notaries across the European Union. It ruled yesterday that six member states - Belgium, France, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria and Greece - had breached the law by restricting access to the notary ...
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Firms freeze trainee recruitment, survey suggests
More than three-quarters of medium-sized firms have frozen graduate recruitment for the next year – despite an increase in applications. A survey of 82 firms with between 20 and 30 employees found that most firms planned to cut costs over the next 12 months. ...
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Conveyancing Quality Scheme makes progress
The Law Society’s chief executive gave an update on the progress of the Quality Conveyancing Scheme at the property section’s annual conference last week. Since registration for the scheme launched in January, Desmond Hudson said 913 firms have applied for the quality mark. ...
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EU announces measures for recovery of cross-border debts
The European Union has announced a new initiative to recover the estimated £48bn of debt that is written off every year because of the difficulty of bringing lawsuits overseas. Some 60% of cross-border debts cannot be recovered because, as the law stands, enforcement measures such as ...
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NHS ‘failing to learn lessons’ of litigation claims
The medical profession is failing to learn lessons from costly litigation claims, according to a leading clinical negligence lawyer. Writing in the latest issue of Clinical Risk, Irwin Mitchell partner Ian Christian says information from legal actions is not filtering back through the NHS. ...
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Conveyancing firms must change to compete, solicitors warned
Residential conveyancing firms must change their business models to withstand the threat posed by new entrants to the legal market place, delegates at the Law Society’s annual property section conference heard last week. The Society’s chief executive Des Hudson said the introduction of alternative business structures, ...
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Rightmove founder enters conveyancing market
The founder of Rightmove has today launched online residential conveyancing service In-deed, intended to shake-up the conveyancing market. Harry Hill, the founder of Rightmove and former chief executive of estate agency Countrywide, said the service would make the home sale process simpler, more transparent and ...
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QualitySolicitors: watch our exclusive interview with Craig Holt
Brands will dominate the legal market when alternative business structures are introduced this October – and firms that have not joined a network such as QualitySolicitors or do not do work for larger brands will find the market ‘very small indeed’. So argues a bullish Craig ...
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Legal aid award finalists announced
The Legal Aid Practitioners’ Group has announced the finalists for its Lawyer of the Year 2011. They include Razi Shah, solicitor at Windsor firm Appleby Shaw, who successfully appealed against the custodial sentence given to Munir Hussain. Hussain had been convicted ...
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Neuberger sets out injunctions review
The UK’s leading judges have warned MPs not to abuse their parliamentary privilege to break the privacy achieved by injunctions. Lord Neuberger, the Master of the Rolls, appeared before the media this morning to set out a review of injunctions. The report ...
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Legal executives should be on ‘equal footing’ to solicitors, claims ILEX
Legal executives should be able to provide the full breadth of services ‘on an equal footing’ to solicitors, the president of the Institute of Legal Executives said yesterday. David McGrady said securing further rights for ILEX members remains the goal of the professional body. ...
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Bar Standards Board reviews barristers’ CPD requirements
The Bar Standards Board has announced a review of the continuing professional development (CPD) requirements for barristers. The biggest proposed change would see an increase in the number of CPD hours that members of the bar are required to do each year, doubling it from 12 to 24. A more ...
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Christianity needs more than just ceremonial support
In his letter of 6 May pertaining to the Comment piece by Andrea Minichiello Williams, ‘Equality law is victimising Christians’, Charlie Klendjian does not appear to have as full a grasp of the facts as he claims. First, the Queen, despite her Coronation Oath, has ...
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Pointing the finger at ideologies
In ‘Equality law is victimising Christians’ (28 April), Andrea Minichiello Williams makes the statement, ‘law cannot be divorced from Christianity’, while criticising totalitarian ideologies like fascism and communism.
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The law comes first
I read the ‘Comment’ article by Andrea Minichiello Williams. The bottom line has to be that no one should expect to be able to put their own beliefs before the law without consequences. People are, perhaps, arrested, sacked and so ...
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That’s religious progress
In her article about ‘Christian persecution’, Andrea Minichiello Williams writes that, for hundreds of years, ‘most of the great advances in public life, in health care, education and social provision, came as a result of Christian conviction that cares for the good of all’. If ...
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Pro bono approval
On 12 May Jonathan Rayner reported on the ‘outcry’ that has arisen because in-house lawyers might be prevented from working pro bono. In addressing this issue, two principles should be kept in balance: