Report comment

Well said, Anon 00.20. I too recall those days when a solicitor from WSW in Chester would come around on behalf of NFU and sort things out in exactly the way you describe. How on earth did we get from there to where we are now? In the way you describe, I guess. Shall we ever get back to where we were? I hope so, but am not optimistic.

Personally, I am of the opinion that most small, high street practices used mainly to be financed by conveyancing and probate with some other non-contentious work. Crime, divorce, PI and litigation generally were makeweights, services when needed to keep the non-contentious clients on board. With the removal of scale fees for conveyancing and mortgage work in 1973, and later from probate, those areas of work became, first, harder to make a living from on their own and, second, let in the pile-'em-high-and-sell-'em cheap sweat shops. So we turned more to looking to making a part of our living from the contentious work. The pile-'em-high lot then saw they could, together with the HMG changes you describe, make money out of that plus some dodgy associated practices. Freedom to advertise was also an aggravating factor.

That whole, downhill trend was further aggravated by HMG's introduction of compulsory PII cover and other regulatory tightening up e g the FS Act 1986, panels for PI, probate, etc etc. The result of these trends has been a squeeze on the small, high street firms, many of whom have disappeared. One I know was hawking itself around begging someone, anyone, to take it over, and for nothing, just to avoid closing with the associated run-off premiums.

Great, isn't it. You slog away for forty years just to find your business is worthless. It would have been better to have qualified as a plumber, and electrician, anything but a high street solicitor.

And the principal victims? The average member of the general public, of course, who can no longer find a solicitor reasonably near who will see to his work for a price he can afford to pay, the very people all these 'improvements' (sic) were designed to protect.

You really couldn't make it up!