Practitioners and the Law Society scent victory in their push for a Civil Justice Council to implement Lord Woolf’s reforms to the justice system. It is believed Lord Mackay will announce he is prepared to go some way towards implementing such a body during the report stage of the Third Reading of the Civil Procedures […]
Kenneth Clarke has ignored the calls of trust lawyers to end inheritance tax iniquities and to institute relief on the costs of self assessment. Lawyers and accountants represented by the Society of Trust and Estates Practitioners (Step) had asked the Chancellor to simplify capital gains and inheritance tax legislation and to correct an imbalance whereby […]
Leading pensions lawyer John Cunliffe, who is head of employee benefits at McKenna & Co, is to retire next June and is considering taking up a lecturing job overseas. He said: “I will be 62 by next June, McKennas’ official retirement age. That is quite old for a City lawyer.” Cunliffe said he was looking […]
Big six accountants Ernst & Young has drawn up a short list of top City lawyers to head its new legal practice and is likely to make an appointment next summer. The firm, which last week published its annual accounts for the first time, has been planning to set up a separate legal practice for […]
Plymouth-based firm Foot & Bowden is expanding to the east of Devon with a takeover of the Exeter office of five-partner Burd Pearse. The 25-partner firm of Foot & Bowden will keep on Burd Pearse’s two Exeter lawyers, partner Simon Gregory and assistant Michael Gay, and most of Burd Pearse’s Exeter administration staff. The remaining […]
The Police Bill is currently before Parliament. Part III proposes to empower chief officers of police and customs to authorise entry to or interfere with property or wireless telegraphy for the purpose of preventing or detecting “serious crime”. We were asked by civil liberties watchdog Liberty to advise it on the legal and constitutional implications […]
Lovell White Durrant has been appointed to advise the Department of Education and Employment on the controversial privatisation of the student loan scheme. The department wants to sell part of the £2bn student loan portfolio and contract out the administrative work of the Students Loan Company, which handles the accounts of 1.3 million students and […]
City firm Berrymans is lightening its load by moving 10 of its lawyers to a new office on the second floor of number 2 Minster Court, next to the London Underwriting Centre and on the doorstep of Lloyd’s. The firm has just taken nine insurance fee earners from marine firm Ingledew Brown Bennison & Garrett. […]
Top-four City VAT partner Stephen Coleclough is leaving Simmons & Simmons to join Coopers & Lybrand because of the “ridiculous hours” he had to work. Coleclough, who took over from Edward Troup as head of Simmons’ tax group 18 months ago, said he ended up taking on part of Troup’s direct tax practice as well […]
Gary Streeter has pledged to “look again” at the Government’s controversial proposals to make legally aided defendants and litigants on income support pay a minimum contribution during a fact-finding visit to a law firm. The parliamentary secretary at the Lord Chancellor’s Department was invited to visit Croydon firm Atkins Hope by partner Charlotte Collier, who […]
International law firm Clyde & Co has formed official links with Rio de Janeiro firm Prates & Carneiro to coincide with the return of its partner in Venezuela to the London office. Stirling Leech has been based in Brazil and Venezuela since 1990 and will continue to be responsible for the firm’s South and Central […]
PAUL Boateng is threatening to introduce legislation to force the Law Society to do more pro bono work if it does not respond to Labour’s calls for action. In correspondence with Law Society president Tony Girling, seen by The lawyer, Labour’s legal affairs spokesman praised the Bar Council for setting up its own pro bono […]