Latest news – Page 870
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News
Child welfare fears add to justice burden
Applications for children to be separately represented in private law family cases have soared by almost 25% in two years, as courts battle to ensure the children’s voices are heard in complex disputes, the Gazette has learned. The number of rule 9.5 applications to appoint a ...
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MoJ widens judicial pool
The government has decided that legal executives will not be entitled to sit as judges on the Competition Appeals Tribunal (CAT), but can apply for other judicial appointments following a consultation earlier this year. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) accepted representations from CAT, the Lord Chief ...
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Eversheds in diversity drive
Top 10 firm Eversheds has piloted a groundbreaking scheme encouraging teenagers from disadvantaged backgrounds to pursue a career in the legal profession, the Gazette has learned. The national firm has been working with government-appointed Widening Participation Officers (WPOs) based at UK universities tasked with increasing the ...
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Pll providers shun small firms
Small firms renewing their professional indemnity insurance (PII) cover will be further squeezed in an already hardening market after insurers Norwich Union and Liberty cut policies for these practices. Norwich Union, which controls 8.3% of the legal PII market, has stopped offering new cover to firms ...
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'Firms favour UK trainees'
City University’s law school is telling international students on its law masters programmes to apply for jobs with US firms or go in-house because recruitment practices at English firms favour UK candidates, the Gazette can reveal. Professor Alan Riley, director of the LLM programme at City ...
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Registry fraud payouts soar
The Land Registry is facing a compensation bill up by £5 million on last year because of an increase in fraudulent title registrations. Figures in its annual report, published in August, show the value of claims pending for losses resulting from errors on the register caused ...
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Rhys Jones fee row threatens trial delay
The solicitor representing the defendant charged with murdering Liverpool schoolboy Rhys Jones has launched judicial review proceedings against the Legal Services Commission (LSC), claiming that the trial has been wrongly classified as a very high cost case (VHCC). Seven defendants are due to go on trial ...
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Thumbs-up for mediation pilot
Employment lawyers have given the thumbs-up to a judicial mediation pilot and called for it to be available in tribunals across England and Wales. Results of a survey carried out by the Employment Lawyers Association (ELA) revealed that the majority (78%) of the 123 respondents who ...
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SRA advocacy plans slammed
Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) proposals to introduce a scheme of voluntary accreditation for solicitor higher court advocates could lead to ‘incompetent solicitors’ appearing in court, the College of Law’s Legal Services Policy Institute has claimed. The institute called instead for mandatory assessment and compulsory accreditation in ...
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Herbert Smith targets lawyers on career break
City firm Herbert Smith is planning to tempt lawyers on a career break to join the firm as part of a recruitment drive. In conjunction with executive search consultancy Sapphire Partners, the firm will host a ‘back to practice’ workshop at its London offices in September, ...
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Pension deal
City firm LG advised Universities Superannuation Scheme – the pension scheme for academic staff in the UK, and the second largest fund in the country – on purchasing a 50% share in an investment property portfolio joint venture with Tesco. City firm Berwin Leighton Paisner advised Tesco.
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A steep learning curve
Solicitors do not have the advocacy experience or training to appoint themselves solicitor-advocates Tim Dutton QC raises valid concerns about solicitors appointing themselves solicitor-advocates (see [2008] Gazette, 31 July, 2). The training solicitors receive in advocacy is quite pitiful and often learned on the hoof. Barristers ...
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Up to standard
In his recent letter, David Pearl suggests that failure to carry out local authority searches is evidence of a lowering of standards (see [2008] Gazette, 31 July, 7).
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Search right
The matter of personal searches has always been controversial, but many firms – both solicitors and licensed conveyancers – rely on searches carried out by an agency and have done for many years. A survey carried out by STL in March 2007, before home information packs became compulsory, indicated that ...
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Double indemnity
I should point out a significant difference between the arrangements for compulsory indemnity insurance for solicitors and those applying to some other professions (see [2008] Gazette, 31 July, 1). The fact that an indemnity insurer has been removed from another profession’s list of preferred providers does not imply that it ...
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Care applications fall sparks safety fears
Applications for child care and supervision orders have plummeted by 25% since councils were forced to bear the full cost of court fees, prompting fears that vulnerable children are being inappropriately placed with relatives instead, the Gazette can reveal. Just 1,611 applications were made by councils ...
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Lawyer kicks off FA insurance battle
A sports lawyer is threatening to sue the Football Association (FA) for failing to insure club footballers against loss of earnings arising from injuries, the Gazette can exclusively reveal. The FA requires all clubs to have at least £5m of public liability insurance. However, it leaves ...
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MP warns courts not to 'jump queue'
A UK bill of rights and freedoms should not enable the courts to help individuals ‘jump the queue’ when pursuing proposed new ‘rights such as healthcare and education, the chairman of the joint committee on human rights has told the Gazette.
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Medical costs on the up
The legal cost of defending doctors and other medical professionals against fitness-to-practice investigations by the General Medical Council has increased fifteen-fold, or 31% annually, over the last decade, according to the Medical Defence Union (MDU). In its annual report, the MDU, a charity founded in 1885 ...
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Legal aid recovery threat
A six-figure claim lodged against a solicitor seven years after he gave up practice has raised the spectre of the Legal Services Commission (LSC) aggressively recouping historic legal aid funding, despite a partial amnesty agreed earlier this year. The commission has launched a High Court ...