Home Office ‘taskforce’ for solicitor misconduct
BBC, Guardian, Gazette, i News (£), Legal Cheek, National Jurist, Daily Mail, Mail On Sunday, Metro, LBC, Solicitors Journal, Morning Star, Independent, Evening Standard, Asian Times, Press & Journal, Suffolk News, Somerset County Gazette, Oxford Mail, Hereford Times, Dorset Echo, North Wales Chronicles, Yorkshire Post and over 300 other regional outlets continue coverage of our reaction to the Home Office announcement that a ‘taskforce’ will be created to target immigration lawyers engaged in misconduct.
This announcement comes after a Mail on Sunday report shows several immigration lawyers submitting false asylum claims.
Law Society Deputy Vice President Richard Atkinson said: “The overwhelming majority of immigration lawyers continue to support the rule of law through their adherence to the law and professional standards set by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and provide an essential service to clients.
“The focus of the Home Office on a tiny minority of lawyers to which they are apparently applying considerable resources should not deflect from the fact that there remains significant backlogs in asylum claims or the unworkability of the Illegal Migration Act.”
Law Society President Lubna Shuja spoke to Channel 4 News (from 0:07:19) and Times Radio (from 01:04:15) about the ‘taskforce’ and its effect on the rule of law.
David McNeill, our Director of Public Affairs at the Law Society, spoke to the BBC Radio 4's Today programme (from 1:12:49), which was subsequently picked up by BBC Radio Humberside, BBC Shropshire and BBC Newcastle, about the government’s crackdown on lawyers. David also spoke to ITV News about the ‘taskforce’.
David said: “It’s not in our interest to have any solicitor acting improperly or crookedly… this announcement today is something of a ‘red herring’.
“This ‘taskforce’ which they tout with such aggressive language has been in existence for months now so really, from our perspective, it just looks like a bit of lawyer-bashing as a distraction from really bad news for the government on the number of asylum seekers now accommodated in hotels – 50,000.”
Richard Young, a member of our Immigration Law Committee, spoke with Sky News and LBC (from 2:25:10) about the Home Office’s announcement.
Joshua Rozenberg also discusses our reaction to the ‘taskforce’ on BBC Radio 5 Live (from 0:48:31).
BBC Leicester (from 3:09:32) cites our comment that a tiny minority of lawyers are falsifying asylum claims and the Times (£) mentions our reactions to the Home Office’s “lawyer-bashing.”
Delays in family courts
Lancashire Telegraph and Wigan Today continue coverage on the delays in family courts which are causing children removed from parents to wait for over a year for a decision on where they will live.
Law Society President Lubna Shuja said: “What is often missed in the debate around the unacceptable backlogs in our family courts is the impact on children. They are suffering the very real consequences of months and sometimes years of uncertainty about their future, preventing them from having the stability they need to thrive.
“Our members are telling us of instances where court delays are leading to increased tension between parties. This is undermining a collaborative and child-centred approach to family separation.”
Cris McCurley, a member of the Law Society’s Access to Justice Committee, said: “As a practitioner it is heartbreaking to have to deal with the consequences of this and I worry about the effect on children, some of whom have not seen their primary carer parent for more than three years. There needs to be investment in the system, now.”
Will witnessing in the pandemic
Today’s Wills and Probate discusses the impact of Covid-19 on the evolution of will witnessing and mentions our 2022 survey on new provisions used in the pandemic for will witnessing.
Also worth a read:
- Alex Chalk remarks on the transfer of asylum seekers to the Bibby Stockholm barge – Telegraph (£)
- Home Office spent over £1,500 of public money to paint over cartoon murals in asylum reception centres – Guardian
- Conservatives likely to campaign to leave European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) – BBC
- UK-Turkey deal to dismantle smuggling gangs – Guardian