Former SRA director calls on Philip or Bradley to go

A former non-executive director at the Solicitors Regulation Authority and City managing partner has joined calls for resignations at the top of the SRA over the Axiom Ince affair. Tony Williams, who sat on the SRA board for six years until 2022, said that if chair Anna Bradley and/or chief executive Paul Philip will not resign or cannot be removed, 'the non-executive directors on the board at the authority should resign'. 

In an article for The Times today, Williams, a former managing partner at magic circle firm Clifford Chance who retired earlier this year as principal at specialist consultancy Jomati, said that the SRA holds regulated firms and individuals to high standards of professional and personal behaviour. 'It is therefore right to expect similarly high standards from our regulators.'

Strongly criticising the SRA's response to last month's independent report published by the Legal Services Board, Williams said: 'There is little sign of humility and only a grudging acceptance that, in retrospect, its officials might have done things differently'.

He noted that when the SRA looked at accumulator firm Axiom in March last year it assessed it as medium risk despite the fact that one person was managing director, compliance officer for legal practice, for finance and administration, and for money laundering, and the money laundering reporting officer. That same person was also the beneficial owner of the firm. 

'One person performing all those roles must give a regulator cause for concern,' he said. 'So now either Anna Bradley, the chair, and/or Paul Philip, the chief executive, should take responsibility and resign. 

'Unfortunately, to date, rather than this happening Bradley has been given a two-year extension to her usually six-year limited term to deal with “recent developments, including evidence of shifting risks in the legal sector”. This looks suspiciously like rewarding failure and a failure of process to identify a new chair by last September.'

Earlier this month, at the SRA's compliance conference, Bradley and Philip said they intended to remain in situ and oversee change.

However Williams said: 'If Bradley and/or Philip will not resign or cannot be removed, the non-executive directors on the board at the authority should resign. The profession deserves no less.'