Last 3 months headlines – Page 1107
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Sentencing
Imprisonment – Length of sentence – Defendants pleading guilty to number of terrorism offence R v Khan and others: Court of Appeal, Criminal Division: 16 April 2013 The Court of ...
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Taxpayer to foot bill for interpreter pay rise
A 22% hike in payments to courtroom interpreters is set to knock a large hole in savings forecast by the government under its ill-starred initiative to contract out the service.
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PCT bidders risk flouting conduct code
Solicitors who bid for the proposed new criminal legal aid contracts risk breaching the Code of Conduct, the Law Society’s head of legal aid policy has warned. Richard Miller told a conference last week that adhering to the model devised by the Ministry of Justice ...
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Scrap ‘flawed’ asylum system, says Society
The UK’s asylum process should be scrapped in favour of a ‘new blueprint’ that will reduce delays and ensure greater fairness and accountability in the treatment of asylum-seekers, the Law Society’s immigration law committee told MPs last week. The revised process would address the ‘deep systemic ...
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PI firms can prosper with right skills, says Graves
Personal injury firms can survive and prosper in the new era of lower fixed fees if they upskill their workforce and filter out more profitable cases, a leading legal consultant has told the Gazette. Lesley Graves (pictured), founder of Citadel Law, said that up to 10% ...
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Malaysian lawyers denied access to clients
Malaysian lawyers have sustained serious injuries at the hands of police, suffered assaults and intimidation, and are routinely denied access to detained clients, an investigation has found. Their representative body is also under threat, with a government minister planning an alternative to the Bar Council of ...
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Majority will avoid sanctions on compliance
Only a small minority of the 928 people or firms being investigated over compliance officer nominations will face sanctions, the Solicitors Regulation Authority revealed last week. Enforcement action is under way against those who either failed to nominate COLPs and COFAs before the deadline or where ...
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Governance threat to M&A
Worries about compliance and governance standards in companies that are takeover targets are having a chilling effect on the international M&A market, a major international study has shown. The study, by the Economist Intelligence Unit for international law firm Baker & McKenzie, says that unless ...
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Society targets ‘special relationship’ with US visit
Closer links between UK and US law firms were the focus of a Law Society visit to Washington DC last week.
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Corporate counsel hold the key to realising commercial promise
Research on cross-border M&A commissioned by Baker & McKenzie concludes that worries about compliance issues in emerging economies lead the list of barriers to acquisition. Such concerns stand between the inherent attraction of acquisitions, and the ability to convert that attraction into a deal. ...
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I want to be a ‘fat-cat’ criminal lawyer
Dear Mr Grayling – please help! I run a medium-sized firm of motor mechanics, employing a team of 20. Most of us used to make a half-decent wage, in line with our experience, servicing and repairing cars for the general public. We were not the ...
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Tendering work in politics
Let us not be hasty in condemning price-competitive tendering. It may not be the way forward for criminal defence services, but it could have useful application in other spheres, most obviously in the selection of politicians.
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Resistance is not futile
The MoJ consultation ‘Transforming Legal Aid: Delivering a more credible and efficient system’ was recently published. The proposals include the removal of legal aid from all prison law matters, save for: sentence length issues that specifically engage article 5 and the right to a review of ongoing detention (basically parole ...
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Flouting the ban
If I remember rightly, referral fees are banned. I am troubled. I hear more than mere anecdotes of telephone calls to referrers from solicitors offering so much up to the end of April, then so much after that, per case. These are solicitors with no existing arrangements with potential referrers. ...
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System crying out for reform
Forgive me for raising a matter affecting the families of murder victims, when we are engrossed in our own future, but it is important. A suspected murderer had gone on the run, hiding away for many weeks. I had represented him before and had no doubt ...
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Contributory negligence: employee or lawful visitor?
In Sharp v Top Flight Scaffolding Ltd, the claimant was so badly injured in the accident that at trial he was a protected party represented by his brother as litigation friend. Mr Sharp was a 43-year-old scaffolder employed by the defendant, who fell while attempting ...
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Lawyers are the same – though different – wherever you go
I have travelled a good deal for more than 15 years, either on behalf of the Law Society or for my current employer, the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE). Since this has been paid either wholly or now in small part by solicitors, it is time ...
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A blow to EL claims
Last week, an attempt to oppose changes to health and safety law that will make it harder for employees to bring claims against their employers, failed in the House of Lords. At the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers’ annual conference this month, APIL past-president David Bott ...
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Rights-forfeit advice
Employees are to be allowed to accept shares in their employer’s business in exchange for surrendering employment rights, following a House of Lords agreement last week. The Lords, which had rejected the plan on two separate occasions, accepted government concessions, including the need for employees to ...