New National Board for Wales
Legal News Wales reports that we have launched our new National Board for Wales to offer a stronger, defined voice to help address the diverging, modern challenges to the legal sector in and between England and Wales.
David McNeill, our Director of Public Affairs, said: “So much is going on in Wales and it’s exciting. In Wales, we see a government and a profession with a plan and some energy and ambitious creativity, they’re finding different ways of solving old problems.
“We’ve created a National Board for Wales which has a positive, proactive agenda-setting function within our organisation. Wales now has a firm, equal voice within that, recognising just how much Wales has to offer the legal profession across the whole of the jurisdiction of England and Wales.”
Working conditions – what rights do I have?
Max Winthrop, a member of our Employment Law Committee, spoke with BBC Radio Shropshire (from 1:46:06) about employees’ working conditions and what legislation is in place to protect UK workers from extreme working conditions.
It follows the news that Elon Musk has reportedly installed sleeping quarters in Twitter’s head office in San Francisco.
Criminal duty solicitor crisis in Cornwall
A consultation by the Legal Aid Agency (LAA) on changes to the Carrick, Kerrier and Penwith schemes in Cornwall has found the number of scheme members has been ‘consistent,’ reports the Gazette.
However, firms on the scheme who responded to the consultation said the LAA’s figures are incorrect and there aren’t enough solicitors. There are also no duty solicitors under 40 in West Cornwall and only two of the 10 duty solicitors on the January 2023 rota are under 50.
Earlier this year, Law Society data revealed that over 60% of duty solicitors in Bristol, Cornwall, Devon, East Sussex, Lincolnshire, Wiltshire and Worcestershire are over 50.
Read our data on criminal duty solicitors
Remote hearings
The Gazette runs an in-depth piece looking at how the courts, lawyers and parties have adapted to the digital revolution necessitated by the pandemic.
Law Society President Lubna Shuja said remote hearings were an “invaluable tool in keeping the justice system operating.”
She added that two years on, solicitors consider remote hearings to be “working well in more technical administrative proceedings, cases in the commercial courts and in hearings which only involve judges and advocates,” but they are “working less well for cases which involve live evidence or significant disputes, such as contested family hearings”.
Also worth a read:
- Ice and snow cause travel chaos – BBC (Live)
- UK GDP rises 0.5% in October – Guardian
- Costs lawyers predict Belsner won’t stop claims deduction disputes – Gazette
- Pinsent & LexisNexis launch new QWE partnership – Legal Cheek
- BSB says inns of court slow to act on behalf of disabled barristers – Legal Futures