All News articles – Page 1592
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News
Sentencing
Criminal procedure - Antisocial behaviour orders - Sentence length - Supply of drugs R v (1) Kirk Jordan Barclay (2) Noah Ntuve (3) Francis Cowan (4) Trevor Junior Prince Campbell: CA (Crim Div) (Lord Justice Pitchford, Mr Justice Cranston, ...
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Sentencing
Criminal law - Cultivation of cannabis - Sentence length R v (1) John Auton (2) Lawrence Hindle (3) Glen Vincent (4) Stephen Willis: CA (Crim Div) (Lord Justice Hughes LJ (vice-president), Mrs Justice Eady, Mr Justice Rafferty DBE): 3 ...
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Personal tax planning for partners: additional considerations
A few weeks ago, I addressed the topic of year-end personal finance planning, with a specific focus on pension contributions and tax relief. There are, however, several additional considerations that partners should also bear in mind as this tax year winds down and planning ...
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Legal aid cuts ‘do little to protect public interest’, says bar regulator
The government’s proposals for legal aid reform have no positive regulatory impact and do little to protect or promote the public interest, according to the bar’s regulator. In its response to the green paper, the Bar Standards Board said the planned scope and eligibility cuts will ...
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Thousands respond to Ministry of Justice legal aid consultation
The Ministry of Justice received 5,000 responses to its consultation on legal aid cuts, Jonathan Djanogly told the Justice Committee this morning. The legal aid minister told the committee he could not discuss what the responses to the consultation, which closed on Monday, but said the ...
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Common sense needed in rape cases
The Crown Prosecution Service has just launched a consultation on guidance governing when individuals who retract allegations of rape or domestic violence should face prosecution. The interim guidance takes immediate effect. It follows a number of high-profile cases, in which women ...
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Protection of Freedoms Bill ‘disappointing’, says Law Society
The new Protection of Freedoms Bill fails to live up to government promises and instead hints at a ‘growth of the surveillance society’, the Law Society has warned. The Society said the legislation, which the coalition claims will scale back on Labour’s ‘intrusive’ policies, will take ...
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SRA streamlines staff levels in move towards risk-based regulation
The Solicitors Regulation Authority is to reduce its staff levels by 12.5% by the end of the year, in an organisational restructure announced today. The reduction in staff numbers forms part of the regulator’s transition to outcomes-focused regulation and the licensing of alternative business structures, which ...
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Jackson’s proposals can’t deliver access to justice at proportionate cost
by Helen Smith, senior broker at TheJudge, a litigation risk transfer broker The legal press has been consumed in recent months with commentary on the imminent doom that will befall the ATE insurance market together with the eradication of recoverability of success fees, should Lord ...
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Bar Council cautions against ‘DIY litigants’
The government’s ‘crude and brutal’ legal aid cuts will trigger a surge in ‘DIY litigants’ that risks ‘gridlock’ in the courts, the Bar Council has warned. Responding to the government’s consultation on legal aid, which closes today, the bar’s representative body said the cuts, which are ...
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Butler-Sloss issues warning over legal aid cuts
The government’s planned legal aid cuts will have a ‘serious adverse long-term effect’ on the justice system, a former president of the family division of the High Court has warned. In a speech to the Society of Conservative Lawyers, Baroness Butler-Sloss said that the plans would ...
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Who can be a lawyer? Two more cases
I meet regularly with representatives of other professions at European level. The legal profession has a number of special features: it is regulated in every EU country, which is not the case with most, if not all, of the others. Secondly, ...
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Law academics slam Jackson’s civil justice proposals
An independent panel of law academics has branded Lord Justice Jackson’s proposals to reform civil litigation costs as ‘misleading and ‘inconsistent with a fundamental principle of civil justice’, as it published a report today. The 11-strong panel, chaired by Bristol University tort law professor Ken Oliphant, ...
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Stoke personal injury firm launches iPhone app
Stoke-on-Trent personal injury firm Attwood has launched an iPhone app that allows users to upload images of their injuries prior to launching a claim. Launching the app today, which allows users to value and make a claim, the firm said that uploaded information can be downloaded ...
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Pro bono figures are a credit to the profession
Last week’s report by the Law Society on pro bono activity by solicitors was a real credit to the profession. The study showed that private practice lawyers performed a whopping £475m of pro bono work in 2009/10, up 19% on the previous year. ...
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Legal services generate £23bn for UK economy
The UK’s top 100 law firms cut their running costs by £500m to help tip themselves into profit last year, research by trade body TheCityUK has found. Profits of the largest 100 UK law firms increased by 1% in 2009/10 to £4.07bn, despite a 4% fall ...
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Free national debt advice service set to close
The Financial Inclusion Fund’s (FIF) free national debt advice service is set to close after the government axed its £25m-a-year funding. Last month, the financial secretary to the Treasury, Mark Hoban, confirmed that funding for the free face-to-face advice service, which has operated since 2005, will ...
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The campaign against proposed legal aid cuts gains public support
Last week’s adjournment debate on legal aid cuts in the House of Commons marked a change in tone among MPs who, before Christmas, had not made much of the Ministry of Justice’s proposed £350m annual cut to the legal aid budget. What became evident in the debate, secured by Labour ...
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Government faces intense pressure over legal aid cuts
The government faced intense lobbying over its legal aid reforms this week, as the Law Society put forward a raft of alternative measures to preserve the legal aid budget, and the shadow legal aid minister warned that the government’s cuts will ‘destroy’ civil legal advice. The ...
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Is opposition to legal aid cuts gaining momentum?
There are now five days left before the consultation on the government’s proposed reforms to legal aid closes on 14 February, St Valentine’s Day. It is noticeable that in the last few weeks lobbying against the plans, which would see the scope of legal aid radically ...