Last 3 months headlines – Page 1336
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ARP firms still owe £8.46m
Law firms in the Assigned Risks Pool still owe £8.46 million in premiums, despite debts falling during 2011. Outstanding premiums have come down from £9.3 million at the end of March this year as regulators clamp down on non-paying firms. The Solicitors ...
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Immigration Advisory Service in administration
The Immigration Advisory Service, a charity that gives telephone advice to 36,000 clients and opens 7,000 appeal files every year, went into administration over the weekend. Cuts to legal aid are thought to be one reason for the charity’s financial problems. According ...
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Privacy, rights and vulnerable people
You might have missed it, but semi-obscured by the unfolding drama over phone-hacking at News of the World, other - I think more interesting - privacy issues have been in the news and on our screens in the past few weeks. The balance of human ...
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Thousands of clients ‘stranded’ following IAS collapse
The collapse of not-for-profit immigration advice provider the Immigration Advisory Service (IAS) will leave thousands of clients without representation, the Law Society warned today. IAS’s legal aid contract allowed it to take on 26,700 new cases a year. It is not ...
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Disgruntled clients: the Ombudsman gives us a glimpse
This week the Legal Ombudsman took a small baby step on a very long and distant path that may - or may not - ultimately end in the publication of complaints upheld by LeO against named law firms. That may or may not happen, and ...
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‘No political will’ to reform marriage laws
There is ‘no political will’ to address the record levels of family breakdown that currently cost the country an estimated £40-100bn a year, a leading family lawyer claimed during a Law Society public debate yesterday. Ayesha Vardag, principal of London firm Vardags, one of a panel ...
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Government ‘sympathetic’ to introducing referral fee ban
The government is ‘sympathetic’ to the idea of banning referral fees, Ministry of Justice minister Lord McNally told the House of Lords yesterday. McNally said that if public opinion demands a ban, the government will respond to that demand. In ...
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LSC publishes plan for interim family contracts
The Legal Services Commission has published a plan for the tender process for new interim family contracts to start in February 2012. It proposes a non-competitive tender, meaning that all applicants meeting the minimum requirements will be awarded a contract. The ...
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SRA braced for ABS interest from abroad
The SRA has been told to prepare for increasing interest from non-English law firms following the introduction of alternative business structures.
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Solicitor-advocates make final effort to halt scheme
Solicitor-advocates have made a final effort to stop a scheme that will see judges evaluating their competence, which they claim would discriminate against solicitors. The Solicitors Association of Higher Court Advocates (SAHCA) has written to Solicitors Regulation Authority board members and called on them to veto ...
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Choosing the right judges
There are many mysterious features of the legal world that baffle clients. But there is perhaps none quite so surprising as when they discover that the judge about to hear their case has little experience in the field of law with which their case is ...
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Judicial review
Availability of remedy - Upper Tribunal - Scottish Court of Session Eba v Advocate General for Scotland: Supreme Court (Lord Phillips P, Lord Hope DP, Lord Rodger, Lady Hale, Lord Brown, Lord Clarke and Lord Dyson): 22 June 2011 ...
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Contempt of court
Committal - Allegations of contempt made against defendant - Whether allegations to be heard before main trial JSC BTA Bank v Ablyazov: Queen’s Bench Division, Commercial Court: Mr Justice Teare: 21 June 2011 ...
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Jurisdiction
Minor - Mirror orders - Malaysian court regulating rights of contact of child - Whether English court has jurisdiction to make orders W v W (minor) (mirror order): Court of Appeal, Civil Division: 17 June 2011 ...
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Will signed on behalf of testator
The case of Barrett v Bem [2011] EWHC 1247 Ch is interesting because of the comments on the nature of probate jurisdiction, and for the guidance it gives on signatures on behalf of a testator. The testator, Martin, made a will in hospital three hours before ...
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Taking the cake
As a veteran of British politics, justice secretary Kenneth Clarke is used to having his picture in the papers, but last week his face appeared more often than usual. Supporters of the Law Society’s Sound Off For Justice campaign held a ‘let them eat cake’ ...