All News articles – Page 1352
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News
Clarke’s trademark insouciance made him ideal for the job of dismantling legal aid
Kenneth Clarke’s singular deportment and affable manner have served to obscure the skeletons in a voluminous ministerial cupboard. Though widely considered a success as John Major’s chancellor, two decades ago he was an architect of the ruinous Private Finance Initiative. Clarke also began the process ...
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Could wishes of legal aid campaigners be Granted?
She is a mixed-race woman who grew up on a council estate and was educated away from Oxbridge. Cynics will suggest it was inevitable that Maidstone MP Helen Grant would be parachuted into a ministerial role, despite entering parliament only in 2010. But is there more ...
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Calm in a crisis: lawyers and the internet age
There are events in the life-cycle of any business that have the potential to snowball into a crisis of unforeseen proportions. It could be a bad set of financial results or a scuppered merger. Or perhaps employee lay-offs, a high-profile desertion to a rival or allegations of misconduct by senior ...
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Admiral reveals referral fee income
Insurance giant Admiral has revealed that it rakes in £7 in personal injury referral fees for every vehicle it covers. The figure appears in the company’s half-year financial report, which lists modest increases in ‘other revenue’, including income from referral fees. Admiral insures 3.5m cars in ...
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Discriminatory acts have a moral significance
by Dr Ronan McCrea, a barrister and lecturer in the Faculty of Laws at University College London Joshua Rozenberg’s piece on the issue of conscience exemptions from anti-discrimination legislation argues that no legitimate aim has been identified for requiring individuals to provide a service in violation ...
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Achieve by sharing problems with other jurisdictions
As is usual for new Law Society presidents at this time of year, I was thrown into the mix of 8,000 lawyers at the American Bar Association’s annual conference, the largest global gathering of lawyers after the International Bar Association’s annual conference. I arrived on American soil with a carefully ...
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Accutrainee welcomes first recruit
A groundbreaking scheme that finds trainees and seconds them to law firms on a temporary basis has welcomed its first recruit. Flora Hussey has become the first trainee to sign up to Accutrainee since it was launched last September. Trainees are taken on by Accutrainee but ...
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ABS newcomer eyes conveyancing panels
A conveyancing sole practitioner has become an alternative business structure – in a bid to get on to lenders’ conveyancing panels. Nicola Phillips, who has run her own firm in Horsham since 2008, told the Gazette that her status as a sole practitioner has excluded her from panels including those ...
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Summertime blues as 250 law firms shut
More than 250 law firms have ceased conducting business since the start of summer, but observers are divided on whether the trend is the first sign of long-awaited consolidation or a statistical blip. Data published this week by the Solicitors Regulation Authority show a total ...
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Increase in damages by 10%
In Simmons v Castle [2012] EWCA Civ 1039, the Court of Appeal has added to the general splashing about which precedes the enactment of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012. In an effort to provide ‘proper, prospective warning’, it has jumped in ahead of the implementation ...
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News
Find your own referral-fee workarounds, SRA tells firms
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has warned that it will not provide law firms with ‘safe harbour’ guidance to deal with the forthcoming referral fee ban. In a discussion paper released yesterday, the regulator says solicitors and firms should be able to work out from the legislation ...
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News
My hope for Chris Grayling
by Eduardo Reyes, Gazette features editor Maybe the new justice secretary is about to have an expensive re-education. I admit that on his record he is not an obvious ‘rule of law’ groupie.
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News
My hope for Chris Grayling
Maybe the new justice secretary is about to have an expensive re-education. I admit that on his record he is not an obvious ‘rule of law’ groupie. On past form, he thinks it’s fine to shoot robbers in the back when they are running away. He was famously a bit ...
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Assumption of responsibility for a subsidiary's responsibilities
In the landmark decision of Chandler v Cape plc [2012] EWCA Civ 525, the Court of Appeal upheld a High Court decision that a parent company owed a direct duty of care towards an employee of one of its subsidiaries to ensure a safe system of work. This case has ...
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‘Cutting edge’ approach to ethics needed - LSB
Proposals to monitor ethics across an increasingly diverse legal services market are set out by the Legal Services Board (LSB) today. Its report says that ensuring the integrity of the profession in this way is central to maintaining public confidence in the rule of law.
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News
Fresh faces at justice ministry after reshuffle
A criminal law barrister and former Labour-supporting law firm founder are among the new faces at the Ministry of Justice after a sweeping reshuffle of ministerial posts. After replacing Kenneth Clarke with Christopher Grayling as justice secretary, Downing Street confirmed this morning that ministers Crispin Blunt, ...
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News
Time to get on with portal plans
If you are trying to run a personal injury practice, you may be feeling pretty frustrated right now. You know that the government intends to extend the road traffic accident protocol vertically to higher value cases (up to £25,000) by next April. You know it will also be extended horizontally, ...
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News
Mergers cannot just be finance driven
The publication of The Law Consultancy Network’s research (July 2012) shows that the appetite for mergers continues unabated, with 80% of the firms surveyed having considered the possibility within the last six months. And for firms heading down the merger path, the spotlight tends ...
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News
Jersey court endorses third-party funding
The Royal Court of Jersey has once again endorsed the legitimate role of litigation funding in bringing cases on the island.
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SRA considers lighter touch for whistleblowers
Whistleblowers who give evidence against colleagues suspected of misconduct may be offered a more lenient punishment for their own involvement under new Solicitors Regulation Authority guidelines. The regulator is this week expected to approve proposals to offer mitigation to witnesses who come forward.