Keeping you up-to-date with the legal stories that matter…
This month’s sector news headlines seem to be dominated by transparency – of price, of ownership and of client identity. As the profession is forced into publicising prices to allow for “more informed choices, improving transparency and competition in the legal market” it is also being told that it is a “facilitator” of dirty money. It is an irony not lost on many practitioners that the result of both of these accusations (however accurate they might be!) is a need to jump through yet more hoops prior to even taking on the client, never mind providing them with legal advice.
Meanwhile, in unrelated, but ironically timed news, Irwin LJ said there should be requirements of ABS’s to show who owns the company and has ‘skin in the game’ of PI claims. I wonder if similar levels of transparency for those entities are even on the SRA’s radar… (by the way, and as someone who advises and assists in the processing of lots of ABS applications, the SRA does have this information, it just chooses not to publish it. Or at least not yet.)