First port of call on solicitor liabilities

The Law of Solicitors’ Liabilities is not the catchiest title, even for a law book. Formerly known as Solicitors’ Negligence and Liability (equally uncatchy), it is now in its fourth edition. I confess that I had not used it before being asked to review it, and so I came to it with an open mind. I found it to be excellent. The mighty Cordery, at nearly £1,000, is beyond most budgets, while Jackson and Powell spreads itself more thinly across several professions, and Gould on Legal Services, though first-class, is now a little old. Flenley and Leech’s book therefore fills an important gap in the market.

The book is both succinct and comprehensive, and I shall have no hesitation in making it my first port of call when required to research a knotty point about solicitors.

All of the important common law and equitable principles governing solicitors’ liability, causation, damages, limitation and so on are covered. The chapter on my own specialist subject, the regulation of solicitors, is admirable and up to date, the authors even footnoting an article which I wrote last year criticising an in-house SRA disciplinary decision. In this edition, the authors have added an important chapter on issues relating to the insurance of solicitors, an undoubtedly important topic for all concerned. This chapter, like the book itself, is thoroughly to be commended.

Gregory Treverton-Jones QC is a barrister at 39 Essex Chambers, London