Latest news – Page 863
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Information commissioner opens up access to property search data
The information commissioner’s decision to allow free viewing of property search data held by local authorities has sparked fears that unregulated ‘cowboy companies’ will flood the search market. In a guidance note, the commissioner said that because most search data held by local authorities was environmental, ...
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Major third-party funding case fails in House of Lords
A major negligence case that first brought third-party funding into the public eye was struck out by the House of Lords last week at a cost of around £2.5m to the litigation funder. IM Litigation Funding admitted that the cost of losing the case, which it ...
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CPS criticised by Justice Committee over victims’ rights
Government proclamations that the Crown Prosecution Service is a champion of victims’ rights are ‘a damaging misrepresentation of reality’, a report said this week. The report by the House of Commons Justice Committee praised the CPS for its collaborative working with police, but raised concerns over ...
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Class actions in employment tribunals called for by government research
Unpublished government research obtained by the Gazette has called for opt-out class actions to be piloted in employment tribunals, so as to deal with the thousands of discrimination and equal pay cases clogging up the system. The report by Lexicon Ltd, whose publication has been delayed ...
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Miners win negligence payouts from solicitors over coal health claims
Injured miners who successfully sued their former solicitors for under-settling coal health compensation claims have won tens of thousands of pounds in settlements, it has emerged. Documents obtained by the Gazette from a law firm that has handled miners’ negligence cases show that a small ...
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Legal Services Board seeks powers to impose huge fines on regulators
The Legal Services Board could punish the Law Society and other regulators with multi-million-pound fines if they fail to meet its regulatory objectives, under proposals published this week. The plans, which would give the LSB powers to fine the Law Society up to £28m for non-compliance, ...
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Fox Hayes £1m FSA fine still unpaid
The Financial Services Authority has yet to recover a penny of the £1m fine it levied against collapsed Leeds firm Fox Hayes for its part in a £15m ‘boiler room’ fraud, the Gazette can reveal. The City regulator fined Fox Hayes in February for failing ...
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PII bills to stay flat for big firms, but rise sharply for small
Professional indemnity insurance (PII) premiums for the top 100 law firms look likely to remain flat for 2009/10 despite a slight increase in claims, insurance broker Marsh said today. Insurance bills for small firms, however, are likely to rise significantly. Marsh, which claims it brokes PII ...
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Mr Justice Gross to head Commercial Court
Mr Justice Gross has been appointed judge in charge of the Commercial Court with effect from 1 October. He will succeed Mr Justice Andrew Smith, whose term of office comes to an end on 30 September. Gross will have overall responsibility for ...
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Co-op launches legal services promotion campaign
The Co-operative has launched a high-profile campaign to promote its legal services to the 17 million weekly shoppers in its food stores. The campaign, which includes in-store radio, till screen displays and door-to-door leafleting, will last nine weeks and aims to promote awareness of the range ...
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Provision gap in the east after East Anglia law centres close
East Anglia is currently without a single legal aid law centre after Cambridge Law Centre and Huntingdon Law Centre, the only two centres in East Anglia, closed down after their parent charity ceased trading. Advice for Life, the charity that ran both law centres, stopped trading ...
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BVT consultation
I write with reference to the letter in support of best value tendering (see [2009] Gazette, 23 July, 11). I am pleased to see that others recognise the potential benefits of best value tendering (BVT). I would, however, reassure Gazette readers that in developing our proposals we have spoken with ...
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National interest
We read with interest the Benchmarks item on forced marriage protection orders (see [2009] Gazette, 23 July, 19).
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Debt blocks access
The final report of the Panel on Fair Access to the Professions should have been seen as the propaganda it is.
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Free dispute mechanism does the bar no credit
I wonder how many solicitors undertaking occasional litigation are aware of the Bar Council’s terms of work, and in particular the mechanism that comes into play if the solicitor disputes a barrister’s fee note.
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ITV and Lovells form pro bono partnership
ITV Legal has launched a new pro bono initiative with City firm Lovells as part of an innovative partnership programme with its panel law firms. The ITV Legal pro bono bank gives in-house lawyers at ITV the opportunity to take part in Lovells’ pro bono work. ...
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Bar Council accuses CPS of ‘Alice in Wonderland accounting’
The Bar Council accused the Crown Prosecution Service of ‘Alice in Wonderland accounting’ this week over the CPS’s claim to have saved millions using its own lawyers rather than external advocates. In its 2007/08 annual report, the CPS said it had saved £17.1m ...
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Claims management market booms with 60% rise in number of firms
The number of businesses entering the claims management market has risen by 60% in the past year, new figures show, while the industry’s regulator said solicitors were responsible for malpractice in personal injury claims-handling. The Claims Management Regulator’s 2009 impact assessment revealed that 2,885 businesses were ...
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Legal Services Commission asks crime lawyers to join assessment pilot
The Legal Services Commission has called for more criminal lawyers to take part in its scheme to test different methods of assessing advocacy, after too few practitioners signed up. Piloting of the Quality Assurance for Advocates (QAA) scheme began in February at Crown courts in Birmingham, ...
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SOCA ignores call to give lawyers feedback on money laundering reports
The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) intends to reject a recommendation that it should provide solicitors and other professionals with feedback when they make suspicious activity reports (SARs), the Gazette has learned. A House of Lords committee last week asked SOCA to provide ‘increased levels of ...