OSS quality targetThe Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine, this week lauded the Law Society's efforts to turn around complaints-handling at the Office for the Supervision of Solicitors (OSS).However, he warned that unless the quality and speed of decision-making improved, the government's 'patience would run out'.

He was 'perfectly willing' to consider more 'radical solutions'.Lord Irvine told a home affairs select committee that real progress had been made at the OSS and that he did not want to 'demoralise' the Law Society 'with excessive threats'.But there had been 'excessive focus' on reducing the backlogged cases and insufficient focus on the quality of decision-making, he said.

Law Society chief executive Janet Paraskeva responded: 'We had to deal with a large number of cases last year that had been open for a long time.

The delay that had occurred on these cases of itself meant that it was always going to be very difficult to meet the target.

We now have a manageable caseload and the quality targets for this year are demanding, but I am determined that we will reach an average Legal Services Ombudsman satisfaction rating of 75% by the end of 2001'.Speaking at the same meeting, Lord Irvine also confirmed that the appointment of the first judicial appointments commissioner was likely to occur next month with the commission being up and running by the autumn.Commissioners would be able to attend all or any judicial appointment meetings, attend interviews, fully investigate complaints and make recommendations; it will be 'fantastically open', he said.Lord Irvine also confirmed that he would consider running a pilot scheme of televised court coverage but only in appeals.

He said the line was 'very firmly drawn in the sand' against cameras in trials because of the possibility of witness and jury intimidation.Sue Allen