All News articles – Page 1700
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News
MoJ admits personal data breaches
Nearly 2,000 people have had personal information about themselves lost by the Ministry of Justice over the past year, in a series of incidents listed in the department’s accounts, published last week. The disclosure comes after the MoJ faced embarrassment last year when its IT supplier ...
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Cyclist makes a splash
Obiter receives quite a few emails about solicitors performing sponsored bike rides and sponsored swims. But this is the first time we have learnt of a lawyer doing both at the same time. David Thomas, a consultant at Bindman & Partners, was happily ...
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Women lawyers receive awards
The Association of Women Solicitors has presented ten ‘outstanding’ women solicitors with awards to recognise their excellence in business and people management. The winner of the large firm award was Susan Bright, head of competition at City firm Lovells, who manages a team stretched across ...
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LSB rebuffs regulator’s plea for control of board appointments
The Legal Services Board (LSB) has rejected a call from the Solicitors Regulation Authority to wrest ultimate control of SRA board appointments from the Law Society. In its latest consultation on legal services regulation, published today, the umbrella body dilutes an earlier commitment ...
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Is Google's Android the best thing since a sliced-up iPhone?
I reckon I've found something better than my BlackBerry. No, really.Since the Gazette got into social media in an increasingly big way, it's been my duty (or pleasure, or bane, depending on the day) to keep an eye on our different media 'channels' and interact with them increasingly regularly.
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What is going on at the LSC and the MoJ?
The latest announcement by the Legal Services Commission delaying the tendering process for the new criminal contracts for at least two months probably comes as a relief to many practitioners, particularly those in the best value tendering pilot areas.
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Junior lawyers on community mission to Borneo
The Junior Lawyers Division (JLD) has teamed up with volunteering charity Raleigh International to develop a unique annual public service project in Borneo. Junior lawyers from the UK will work with a local community in the south-east Asian island of Borneo on infrastructure projects to build ...
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The right to choose your own lawyer
The European Court of Justice this week decided a case relating to the free choice of lawyers (Case C-199/08, Eschig). The Court overrode a condition in an insurance policy and decided that a European directive granting free choice of lawyers had to be respected regardless of the insurance condition.
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Diary of a redundancy (part two)
The train home is weirdly empty: no grim-faced commuters. Home is weird, too. You’ve never before witnessed its weekday rhythm: the sounds of playtime from the primary school, the clink of bottles over the whine of the milkman’s electric float. You’re normally still in London this early in the day, ...
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Best value tendering pilot deferred
Tendering for all criminal contracts, including the best value tendering (BVT) pilot process, has been deferred for at least two months, the Legal Services Commission announced today. Tendering for the 2010 criminal contracts was due to begin in October, but the LSC has put the date ...
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Memory lane
Looking back on some rather dated advertisements, while we've also managed to pull out a letter that amusingly describes a client's interpretation of lawyer interactions. Law Society’s Gazette, September 1959 ...
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Solicitors in referral tie-up with IFAs
Solicitors and independent financial advisers (IFAs) have entered into a nationwide tie-up to take advantage of the relaxation of the rules on partnerships between lawyers and non-lawyers. Some 600 law firm members of the 360 Legal Group will be given access to 1,700 IFA members of ...
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New ideas to squeeze more value from private practice
Long gone are the days when going in-house was likened to putting on a comfy pair of slippers. General counsel now enjoy high status as custodians of the corporate purse strings. They want more for their money and are getting it. Fixed fees and rigorous panel ...
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Swiss legal professional privilege plea for foreign in-house lawyers
Europe’s largest association of corporate general counsel has asked the Swiss government to bolster legal professional privilege for foreign in-house lawyers working in the country. The call comes after the Swiss government put forward a draft bill to grant resident corporate counsel a right to legal professional privilege – a ...
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Defendants on videolink 'get raw deal', warn solicitors
Defendants who appear in court via videolink are being ‘treated differently’ from those who appear in person, solicitors have warned, with a much higher proportion going unrepresented. The pilot virtual court, whereby defendants make their first appearance in court via videolink from a police station, has ...
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Court jesters offer light relief
Is there something about the courtroom – the gravitas of the surroundings, the adversarial ambience – that makes people’s minds (professionals included) turn to mush? Having stumbled across some of the amusing courtroom quotes collated by Mary Louise Gilman, editor of the National Shorthand Reporter, Obiter is beginning to wonder. ...
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The true cost of social mobility
Your feature about social mobility underplayed what can be the biggest barrier for applicants to the law – money (see [2009] Gazette, 20 August, 8).
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SRA considers foreign lawyer language test
Foreign qualified lawyers seeking to practise in England and Wales may have to pass an English language test under proposals to be considered by the Solicitor’s Regulation Authority board this week. The SRA’s education and training committee has put forward the recommendation as an amendment to ...
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Employment complaints rise by a third – LCS
Complaints against employment solicitors have risen by almost a third in the past year, while personal injury lawyers saw a 15% rise, the Gazette has learned. However, complaints against conveyancing solicitors fell by nearly a fifth, to 1,184. The latest figures, obtained ...