Immigration advice should become a reserved legal activity to prevent non-authorised persons causing ‘consumer detriment’, the Law Society argues today.

In a response to a Legal Services Board discussion paper, the Society offers to help assure quality standards by ‘providing further adjuncts’ to its Immigration and Asylum Accreditation Scheme (IAAS). The LSB discussion paper, published in March this year, claimed that regulators have an ‘inadequate understanding’ of the immigration advice market and do not know if lawyers provide a good service.

The paper noted that there is confusion over the regulatory regime, with the functions of the qualifying regulators - the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the Bar Standards Board and ILEX Professional Standards - overlapping with the functions of the Office of the Immigration Services Commissioner, a Home Office body.

The Law Society’s response says that immigration practice should not be treated as a special case, but should become a ‘reserved legal service under the full supervision of the LSB’. It says that solicitors undertaking reserved activities are subject to ‘extensive training requirements’ and are ‘heavily protected by insurance’ - both advantages that the profession can bring to immigration work. Along with IAAS accreditation, these mechanisms will ensure that the LSB does not need to intervene, it says.

‘However, we would only support this [level of regulation] if any regulatory burdens are proportionate to the desired outcomes,’ the Law Society says.