Eagle-eyed delegates at this week’s SRA compliance conference will have noticed that BBC anchor Clive Myrie was not, as advertised, chairing the event.

Given that Myrie was presenting the BBC’s News at Ten from Jerusalem the night before, it was probably a stretch to expect him to hot-foot it to Birmingham. The SRA’s director of communications stepped in at the last minute and did a fine job, though you wonder whether Myrie might have been a little more probing during a Q&A session with chief exec Paul Philip and chair Anna Bradley.

The real fun was in the breakout sessions, and in particular the one on compliance queries.

One anonymous person asked through the conference app whether the SRA had banned consensual sexual relations between colleague (short answer: no).

Another individual raised a hand to ask whether it was ok to employ a former solicitor who had previously been struck off. Perhaps he was just interested, but asking it of the SRA’s head of legal and enforcement, who was on the panel, would seem a sure-fire way to have the regulator on your back for a while.

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