The Solicitor Sole Practitioners Group (SPG) will this week stage a last-ditch attempt to block legislation allowing the creation of alternative business structures. The group, which represents 4,500 solicitors across England and Wales, claims it is still possible to prevent so-called ‘Tesco law’ from coming into force.

The group’s parliamentary campaign has included writing to every MP warning them of the impact of the reform, together with a parliamentary lobbying event today.

Opening of the legal services market to external investment and non-lawyers has been on the cards since the Legal Services Act in 2007, and the first ABS application was made on October 6 this year.

But the SPG says part five of the act, which permits companies or private equity investors to buy and launch their own firms, can take effect only through parliament passing a statutory instrument. This will happen automatically on November 7 unless MPs ‘pray against it’ by lodging their opposition.

The SPG remains hopeful of convincing them to do so, following the motion sponsored by Liberal Democrat Tom Brake, a member of the Justice Committee, Conservative Peter Bottomley and Labour’s Valerie Vaz.

Clive Sutton, honorary secretary of the SPG, said: ‘ABS threatens the availability of access to justice for society’s most vulnerable, who often rely on the one-to-one relationship and independent legal advice provided by high street firms.

‘Four years on from when the original act was passed and following a global financial crisis characterised by the miss-selling of many financial products by institutions divorced from their communities, it is not too late for parliament to prevent the legal system going the same way as the financial services sector.’

However, even a victory on the statutory instrument would merely delay the inevitable. Justice minister Jonathan Djanogly last week confirmed that progress has been made in designating the Solicitors Regulation Authority as a licensing authority for ABS firms.

  • The radical shakeup of the legal services market will be good for the international competitiveness of UK law firms, Law Society president John Wotton said this week. Wotton, leading a trade mission of law firms to Dubai, said: ‘The new legal services landscape only enhances the UK’s position at the epicentre of the world’s legal market.’The advantages of ABSs would not necessarily create unfair competition, Wotton said, ‘for ABSs will have to operate to exactly the same professional standards, under the same regulatory regime as existing firms’.