Latest news – Page 877
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News
Council replaces legal post with head of corporate governance
A county council is replacing the role of head of legal and democratic services with a head of corporate governance as part of a series of measures to make £1.4m in efficiency savings. The move, by Northamptonshire County Council, is likely to attract widespread interest ...
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QualitySolicitors demonstrate outside Royal Courts of Justice
QualitySolicitors.com, the legal marketing brand, marked its launch this week with a symbolic demonstration outside the Royal Courts of Justice against the prospect of supermarkets offering legal services – so called ‘Tesco law’. Participants shouted ‘Say no to Tesco law’ and handed out cans of ...
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New guidance for child care and supervision cases
The Ministry of Justice is drawing up new guidelines to help local authority lawyers tackle problems faced during child care cases. The Gazette has learned that new guidance is intended to make the Public Law Outline (PLO), introduced in April last year, more effective and ...
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Law Society warning over Registry’s early completion plan
Land Registry plans to streamline the completion process will increase solicitors’ costs and make conveyancing less efficient, the Law Society has warned. The new ‘early completion’ practice applies where an application for a discharge of whole has been received along with other applications, but ...
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Jackson proposes Commercial Court cost reforms
Costs rules for high-value complex commercial cases could be amended after the judge in charge of a wide-ranging review of civil litigation costs opened the door for reforms. Despite opposition from the Commercial Court Users Committee (CCUC), which is carrying out its own review of ...
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Madoff fraud prompts rush of securities lawsuits
Convicted tycoon Bernard Madoff’s ponzi fraud spawned 30% of securities lawsuits worldwide in the first quarter of 2009, research has indicated. Of the 169 new securities lawsuits filed in Q1 this year, 50 related to the Madoff fraud, according to business data company Advisen. ...
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Bids for nuclear development sites, mining rights and property sales
Going nuclear: Magic circle firm Freshfields advised energy company E.ON on its successful bid for nuclear development sites in Oldbury and Wylfa. E.ON, alongside joint venture partner RWE, acquired the land at a Nuclear Decommissioning Authority auction, where three sites were sold for ...
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Criminal justice system ‘institutionally sexist’
Women suffer widespread discrimination at all levels of the criminal justice system, including in the legal profession and judiciary, according to a report launched at the Law Society today by equality campaigners the Fawcett Society.
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Law Society of Scotland 60th anniversary conference: Susskind fires private equity warning
Private equity firms are stepping up their interest in English legal practices as they search for lucrative investment opportunities in a difficult market, according to Professor Richard Susskind, author of The End of Lawyers? However, the legal services futurologist warned that law firm owners hoping to ...
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LSB consults on regulation of new business structures
The Legal Services Board today stressed its determination to sanction alternative business structures by mid-2011, as it launched a discussion paper on how they will be regulated. The board said it will directly license ABSs if the approved regulators do not seek to become licensing authorities. ...
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Chancery Lane steps in to help run migrant lawyer programmes
The Law Society is to help law firms run internship and secondment programmes that were threatened by new immigration rules by launching a scheme for migrant lawyers under Tier 5 (T5) of the points-based system (PBS). As the overarching body for the scheme, the Society will ...
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Straw drops secret inquest plans
Plans to hold secret inquests without juries have been dropped by the government, justice secretary Jack Straw told parliament today. Straw said in a written statement that the move to introduce non-jury inquests on national security issues did not garner enough support among the parties. Clauses ...
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FSA says it will target City professionals in insider dealing fight
City professionals are a priority target for the Financial Services Authority in its battle against insider dealing, the watchdog said this week. The FSA has begun insider dealing prosecutions against two lawyers who had worked in the London offices of US law firms. According to court papers, Andrew Rimmington, formerly ...
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Bradley review 'revolution' in mental illness treatment of offenders
A report calling for offenders with mental health problems and learning difficulties to be identified and diverted to health rather than criminal justice services may revolutionise the handling of such cases. Lord Bradley’s review of people with mental health problems in the criminal ...
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Top legal aid fee-earners named
The squeeze on legal aid spending has not yet consigned the million-pound-a-year legal aid barrister to history, Ministry of Justice statistics revealed last week. Charles Salmon QC of London’s Hare Court topped the annual league table of the highest-paid criminal legal aid barristers. He received ...
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Law Society to review access to justice
The Law Society has launched a wide-ranging review of access to justice to mark the 60th anniversary of legal aid. Andrew Caplen, chairman of the Society’s access to justice committee, will study the long-term policy options for publicly funded criminal and civil legal services, the Society said this week. ...
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Serious Fraud Office to ask parliament to grant it new powers
The Serious Fraud Office is to ask parliament to enhance its powers to fight fraudulent companies and corrupt directors, the Gazette has learned. The investigation and prosecution agency has begun consulting privately with senior lawyers and officials before it approaches parliament later in the year. Sources close to the discussions ...
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Lord Hunt outlines vision for regulation
The peer tasked by Chancery Lane with reviewing legal regulation says that only ‘minor’ adjustments to the Law Society’s internal governance may be required to yield ‘enormous benefit’ for the regulation of law firms. Lord Hunt of Wirral wants to see a system of regulation emerge ...
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New provider to enter PII market
The single renewal date of 1 October is not the only cause of last year’s problems with professional indemnity insurance (PII) renewals, the chairman of the Law Society’s PII working group stressed this week. Nigel Day, a partner at Manchester firm Hague Lambert, said: ‘It’s ...
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After-the-event insurers seek clarity from Ministry of Justice
After-the-event (ATE) insurers are calling for a seat at negotiations about a new claims process amid fears that the question of when solicitors can take out insurance is back on the table. The Legal Expenses Insurance Group (LEIG), which represents seven insurers, has written to the ...