Legal Services Act: New forms of practice and regulation

Comment submission form

This form is designed to be completed electronically—in MS Word—not as a printed form. You must save it locally before and after completing it. For submission instructions, see page12.

Changes in regulation are required by the Legal Services Act in order to allow for new forms of legal practice. In Legal Services Act: New forms of practice and regulation, we have described the way we plan to approach the changes.

We encourage you to comment on our current thinking—so that upcoming consultations can address all of the key issues.

Please tell us if you have any initial concerns under the specific headings below. Each heading names an issue addressed in Legal Services Act: New forms of practice and regulation, available at paragraph references are included for your convenience.

Proposed timescale for the introduction of LDPs (para 1.8)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS agrees that the proposed timescale of introducing LDPs between December 2008 and March 2009 is reasonable. LDPs should be introduced as speedily as possible to allow firms to take advantage of the benefits of LDPs. It will also allow sufficient time before implementation of the ABS regime to assess the experience of regulating LDPs.

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Design principles (para 2.5)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS agrees with the broad strategic principles of adopting a targeted, risk-based and proportionate approach to the introduction of new forms of practice and regulation. It is important that the first design principle is construed in this context, with restrictions over and above those provided for in the Act only being introduced where there is a very strong case for doing so.

Proposal to passport existing partnerships and sole practitioners to firm-based regulation (para 3.9 and para 3.4)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS agrees with the principle of passporting firms into firm-based regulation. However, the CLLS is concerned that this concession is diluted by the suggestion of requiring partnerships to provide information required for an initial application after a set time period. Taken with the proposed introduction of an annual registration process, this time period will presumably be quite short.

“Fit and proper” test for non-lawyers, and whether there should be any requirements for other authorised persons (para 3.10)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS suggests that the "fit and proper" person test for non-lawyers is not unduly onerous as this will negate any benefits of the opportunities presented by the Legal Services Act.
It agrees with the SRA's suggestion that it will be unnecessary to apply any application process to other lawyers who have demonstrated that they are fit and proper persons to other approved legal regulators.
Though the CLLS would guard against a general approach of importing systems used by other regulators designed for different sectors, it suggests that a helpful comparison could be made with the FSA approved person test. This sets out three criteria:
honesty, integrity and reputation;
competence and capability; and
financial soundness.
The first and third criteria could be met by self-certifying that there are no previous criminal convictions or bankruptcy, with the SRA conducting random checks. The second is a matter for firms to assess.

Moving to an annual process for all recognised bodies (para 3.16)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS does not see the need for an annual report for all firms. Increasing the reporting burden will have a disproportionate effect on legal practices of all sizes. It will also involve the SRA in an enormous and unpalatable regulatory burden.
However, the CLLS does recognise the need to assess the risk a firm poses. Presumably, the SRA already has information regarding disciplinary action, size of firm etc. It could conduct an initial, targeted and limited information gathering exercise to complete risk assessment. It could then structure future information gathering according to risk, with low risk firms providing information, for instance, every three years.
The CLLS suggests that risk might be assessed by the nature of the non-legal practices carried out by the firm. For instance, a firm which promotes to partnership an HR director who provides no services to clients would be considered very low-risk. The SRA may also wish to consider the proportion of non-lawyers to lawyers when assessing risk factors.

Moving to an individual process for the issue of practising certificates (para 3.17)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS does not agree that an individual process for issuing practising certificates is appropriate. In practice, the bulk of the work will still be done centrally by firms. Imposing an individual obligation will lead to a disproportionate administrative burden for lawyers and the SRA.

Apportionment of regulatory costs between firms and individuals (para3.19)

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

The CLLS is concerned that there is transparency regarding the basis on which fees will be calculated and that fees are apportioned fairly. It agrees that detailed consultation with the profession will be vital in determining satisfactory procedures.
Additional comments
Overseas practice (paragraph 3.3)
The CLLS has initial concerns about the suggestion that the SRA may extend firm-based regulation to overseas practice in the future. There is the potential for conflict between rules of different legal regulators in different jurisdictions. The CLLS suggests the SRA avoids imposing any additional burdens on overseas practice where it operates under the regulatory regime of a competent authority. Further, the imposition of regulation which differentiates such a firm from other local practices may be anti-competitive.

We also ask that you give us early warning of any potential equality and diversity impact of our proposed approach to the changes in regulation required by the Act.

Please enter your comments and/or initial concerns below:

About you

Thank you for detailing your comments and initial concerns.

Please identify yourself below.

Surname

Dunn

Forename(s)

Stella

Your SRA ID number (if applicable)

Name of the firm or organisation where you work

The City of London Law Society

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We will use your email address if we need to contact you about your comments.

Email updates

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Confidentiality

We may publish a list of respondents and a report on responses. Partial attributed responses may be published. Please advise us if you do not wish us to attribute your response or for your name or the name of your firm or organisation to appear on any published list of respondents.
Attribute my/our response and publish my/our name.
Do not attribute my/our response and do not publish my/our name.

I am submitting comments…

Please identify the capacity in which you are submitting comments by selecting one option only from the list below. To select an option, click on the check box next to it.

on behalf of my firm / Please enter its name
on behalf of a Law Society board or committee / Please enter its name
on behalf of a representative group / Please enter its name
on behalf of a local law society / Please enter its name
The City of London Law Society
as an academic / Please enter the name of your institution
on my own behalf as a solicitor in private practice
on my own behalf as an employed solicitor
as another legal professional / Please specify
as a non-lawyer interested in participating in the new forms of legal practice / Please specify
as a trainee solicitor
as a student studying for a qualifying law degree or legal practice course
as a member of the public
in another capacity / Please specify

Thank you for identifying yourself.

More about you

We want to ensure that responses capture the opinions of a wide cross-section of the profession and stakeholders. Please help us by answering several more questions about yourself.

A. Questions about you

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Do you have any disability that has a substantial and long-term effect on your ability to carry out day-to-day activities? / Yes
No

Submission instructions

Thank you for completing our Comment submission form.

Please save a copy of the completed form.

Please return it as an email attachment to , by 14 December 2007.

Alternatively, print the completed form and post it to

Susan PerrySusan Perry

Solicitors Regulation AuthoritySolicitors Regulation Authority

Berrington CloseorDX 19114 Redditch

Ipsley Court

Redditch

Worc B98 0TD

We are unable to acknowledge receipt of responses. We take this opportunity to thank you for your comments.

November 2007Page 1 of 9