Latest news – Page 687
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Lawyer trust stats to inform Society campaign
The need to build public trust will inform a forthcoming Law Society campaign to promote the solicitor brand, after a high-profile survey revealed a contrasting picture of consumer perceptions. Satisfaction with the value for money of legal services rose from 56% in 2011 to 59% ...
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Medics shake up regulation
An independent medical tribunal that is expected to handle some 340 doctors’ fitness-to-practise hearings a year launches today. The new Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS), which is operate separately from the General Medical Council (GMC), is to adjudicate on complaints made against any of the UK’s ...
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LSB report highlights web advice shortfall
Consumers of legal services want more tailored support from the internet as a first point of contact for their legal problems, a report has found. Research carried out by the Legal Services Board found consumers were often ‘swamped’ by information online and gave up halfway through ...
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Forced marriage to be criminalised
Forcing someone to marry will become a criminal offence in England and Wales, the prime minister confirmed today. But the legislation will not be introduced until the 2013/14 parliamentary session. The maximum sentence for the offence has yet to be decided. Breach of a Forced ...
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Law firms warned of cyber crime threat
UK law firms must strengthen their online security to protect clients from international hacking fraud, a former assistant US attorney warned today. He added that UK and US intelligence services report that China and Russia are both putting more resources into industrial espionage operations and that ...
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DWF to merge with Scots firm
National firm DWF has announced plans to merge with Scottish firm Biggart Baillie from next month. The business law firm, which last week topped the £100m turnover mark for the first time, will add to its 10 existing offices with further bases in Glasgow and Edinburgh. ...
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Osborne Clarke continues strong revenue trend
National firm Osborne Clarke has reported a new high in revenues for the last financial year of £97.7m. The figure was an increase of 8% on the previous year and reflected the firm’s best financial performance in its history. Net profit increased by 6% during 2011/12. ...
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Portal won’t cope with extension, says Law Society
The Law Society will refuse to support an extension of the RTA portal until there are major structural changes to the system. The Society has warned the government it will be impossible to extend the portal to include employer and public liability cases.
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LSB sets diversity reporting deadline
Law firms have until the end of September to provide diversity data about every member of staff, including their ethnicity, religious beliefs, socio-economic background and sexual orientation. The timeline emerged last week when the Legal Services Board (LSB) published its qualified approval of the Solicitors Regulation ...
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Unity is strength
Des Hudson and Avtar Bhatoa’s remarks (Hudson: bar strike would ‘damage profession’) will, regrettably, be music to Whitehall’s ears. The criminal bar does not want to strike. Over a number of years, we have lobbied and campaigned in the public interest against reforms and cuts ...
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No slave labour
In his Comment Hekim Hannan states: ‘Why take on a trainee in Sept 2013, pay them £33,300 over two years when you could take on a paralegal on the minimum wage... give them a training contract the following year and pay £33,195 over a three-year period’. ...
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Training woes
Susan Singleton clearly does not ‘get’ how hard it is these days to qualify and how much competition there is. I agree that persistence does usually pay off. However, with tuition fees now at £9,000 a year for a law degree, not to mention the Legal ...
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What’s in a name?
There may be a very good reason why solicitors are reluctant to give their names to reporters after representing their clients in the local magistrates’ court. Reporters never write it down correctly and always get it wrong. I have never lived down a report in our ...
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Keep out of politics
The Law Society says that government plans to make it easier for small businesses to dismiss employees will not help those businesses to grow. The Society’s Employment Law Committee chairman’s views to this effect were quoted in a Society press release.
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Banking on caution
Christopher Digby-Bell’s letter urging lawyers to rein in their banking clients rang a bell with me. In the early 1970s, when I was working as a newly qualified solicitor for a magic circle firm, I raised a query with a secondary banking client concerning the wisdom of some of their ...
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Red-tape bonfire plan for legal services bureaucracy
The government will today invite the legal profession to identify business-restricting regulations, naming three ‘sector champions’ as intermediaries. In the legal services stage of prime minister David Cameron’s ‘red tape challenge’ the Ministry of Justice has pinpointed more than 150 regulations suitable for scrutiny. Lawyers will ...
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'Self-serving' interpreter figures slammed
The shadow justice minister has criticised as ‘self-serving’ performance data released on the company contracted to provide court interpreters. The data, published by the Ministry of Justice last week, revealed that hundreds of cases were still being disrupted by a shortage of interpreters three months into the contract. ...
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Plaid Cymru hails legal devolution
Plaid Cymru’s Westminster leader Elfyn Llwyd has insisted Wales can benefit from a separate legal jurisdiction - despite warnings it may harm the principality’s appeal to business. Llywd told the House of Commons last week that there would be legal and economic advantages to devolving the administration of justice. ...
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Reserved service plea by Society over immigration advice
Immigration advice should become a reserved legal activity to prevent non-authorised persons causing ‘consumer detriment’, the Law Society argues today. In a response to a Legal Services Board discussion paper, the Society offers to help assure quality standards by ‘providing further adjuncts’ to its Immigration ...
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Government move to replace tribunal judges splits profession
Government plans to save time in employment tribunals by using ‘legal officers’ in place of judges appear to have split the profession. One employment specialist described the idea as ‘short-sighted and utterly wrong’, while another told the Gazette that any innovation that ‘allows heads to ...