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The SRA is NOT independent - clearly it does favours for the Government and vice versa. Paul Philip takes no notice of MPs because he can. Amazingly he's been made a member of the new taskforce to combat money laundering in the UK, goodness knows why.
Mr Philip is the worst possible person to form part of the taskforce to prevent money laundering - he is blind to it.

A letter signed by 44 MPs was recently sent to Mr Philip asking the SRA to finally act correctly in relation to the Ecohouse fraud by establishing fraud and dishonesty against its members and revisiting the derisory justice delivered at the original SDT hearing. The MPs requested that the SRA bring a 2nd SDT trial against the firm's solicitor (Sanders & Co.), who facilitated the colossal fraud:-
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1SNZ65mnouDFhkkUF5AxPB837yH34WHMi

Mr Philip's response to the letter is shown below :-
https://drive.google.com/open?id=17Rdu8B82jyOcNTfH-kRgSz_qkVVpqDzv

In Mr Philip's baseless attempt to justify the SRACF refusing a grant against victims claims for redress against the fraud he states :-

"It is not the usual business of a solicitor to set up escrow accounts where there is no underlying legal transaction. Here the firm simply received money in and paid it over to Ecohouse (less its costs)."

I do believe that Mr Philip has confirmed that the firm (and its solicitors), in reneging on their agreed legal due diligence and simply paying over client money to Ecohouse, have involved themselves in "Money laundering" / "Fraud".

Despite the above, and despite not having alleged dishonesty at the original SDT trial, Paul Philip has refused to bring a new trial against the solicitors involved, arguing that no new information has come to light - this is untrue. In refusing to bring a new trial, Mr Philip is effectively turning a blind eye to money laundering / fraud and dishonesty in the Ecohouse case, and has shown no interest in administering correct justice against those crimes.

At the original trial the SRA did not even allege dishonesty or the solicitors giving credibility to and involving themselves in transactions that bore all the hallmarks of a fraud. The consequence of which, is that none of the solicitors were struck off. It is a blatant miscarriage of justice at the very least.

Recently one of the victims of the fraud brought a lay application to the SDT in an attempt to bring proper justice against the solicitors concerned and to bring a retrial under the correct allegation of dishonesty. The SDT referred his application back to the SRA for their opinion and they have been in possession of the lay application for several months - it contains allegations of dishonesty and the solicitors involving themselves in transactions to a scheme which bore all the hallmarks of fraud (exactly what the SRA should have alleged in the first instance). This is the new information that Paul Philip has denied exists.There is also significant evidence of dishonesty that wasn't submitted to trial.

The same crooked SRA officer who buried a stack of evidence of dishonesty previously, has considered the lay SDT application and has argued that there is no new information / evidence to support a further SDT hearing. Be in no doubt, the lay application is needed to correct the SRA's perversion of justice at the original SDT trial due to their burying evidence of dishonesty, which I'm sure you will agree holds true in a case involving solicitor facilitated fraud.

Paul Philip can't see money laundering when it is happening right under his nose - it's selective blindness of course, and comes into play in significant fraud cases when the SRA seeks to deprive redress to victims of solicitor contrived fraud in order to evade bankrupting the SRACF.

Paul Philip should surrender his position as a member of the new taskforce as well as his position as SRA CEO, because where the Ecohouse fraud is concerned, under his misguided direction, the SRA has perverted the course of justice in order to evade paying compensation to victims, and has permitted fraudulent solicitors to remain in the profession after brief suspensions. Under Mr Philip, the protection that the SRA purports to provide to legal service consumers is in itself a lie and a fraud.