The Legal Services Board is ready to collaborate with frontline watchdogs to create a regulatory ‘safe space’ in which to road test new policies and business models that could improve access to justice.
Chief executive Craig Westwood made the commitment at a launch event on Tuesday for the Legal Services Consumer Panel report ‘Regulatory Leadership on Access to Justice’.
Regulatory sandboxes are well established in financial services, and have been used in other sectors such as transport and aviation as well as legal technology (lawtech). They involve the modification or removal of the usual regulatory requirements to facilitate innovation, in order to provide evidence for policy and legislative change.
The creation of an access to justice innovation sandbox for testing and trialling innovations is one of the report’s core recommendations. ‘Financial services providers often work with people who are struggling with aspects of unmet legal need, especially debt-based advice, which requires skilled intervention at times,’ the report notes. ‘There have been some tentative moves towards collaboration between the legal and financial services sector, but such initiatives could be accelerated by the development of suitably badged, visible, and insured options, with regulatory and professional body “buy in” and support.’
Westwood told yesterday’s event: ‘While the most transformative levers [for enhancing access to justice] sit with the government, we hope and expect frontline regulators to embrace this report and its findings as they consider how best to contribute.
‘Regulation can and should play a pivotal role in enhancing access to justice. We are looking specifically at the regulatory sandbox agenda. We really think this could create a space for testing new ideas offering a promising avenue for innovation.’
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