Congratulations to the winners of this year’s The Lawyer/Hifal Awards. Shoosmiths & Harrisons deserves particular mention for scooping two awards – client care and management, while Doughty Street Chambers was, for the second year, winner of the Chambers award. Leigh Day & Co has certainly made its mark in recent years and its win as […]
While practitioners are happy to read of Henry Hodge’s appointment as deputy chairman (not chair, which is an item of furniture) of the Legal Aid Board, their pleasure is derived from the hope that he will put forward, in unequivocal terms, the desirability of their being paid properly and promptly for the work they do. […]
That well-known journalist Chapman Pincher, in a letter to The Sunday Times, recently said that going to law in the UK is “like going to war, the only certainty being the cost”. He continued: “The adversarial British High Courts are not based on the principle of justice but are a fancy dress charade in which […]
After a hearing the week before last Mr Justice Pill is expected to give his decision this week in a High Court challenge to the right of Home Secretary Michael Howard to increase the minimum sentence tariffs in respect of the killers of Jamie Bulger.
Peta Sweet reports In a move understood to be a first at the Bar, James Hunt QC’s chambers at One King’s Bench Walk has introduced a regular “salary” scheme for members of chambers. The scheme, devised in conjunction with the set’s bankers, Coutts & Co, currently has 15 members signed up. It allows for fixed […]
I was somewhat vexed by Brian Ellingsworth’s letter in 12 March issue of The Lawyer which inferred that, in private practice, solicitors merely tell their clients they cannot do something, instead of identifying their objectives and finding a way they can be achieved. When approached by a client, there are always three questions I ask: […]
Duncan Lamont was born in London on 10 June 1961. He is a media lawyer at City firm Biddle & Co. What was your first job? Sheepskin coat salesman, Oxford Street, London. What was your first ever salary as a lawyer? £30 per week, outdoor clerk East End Solicitors (1979). What would you have done […]
In response to your article, ‘Angry CPS lawyers threaten strike’ (23 April) I wish to clarify the position of the FDA CPS Section, which represents the majority of lawyers within the CPS, and to correct a number of factual inaccuracies. The original motion considered by the CPS Section Council had been circulated prior to publication […]
Dr Haten Yassine, who was sacked from his job at Brunel University, Uxbridge, has launched an action in the High Court over his dismissal. Yassine has issued a writ against the university seeking damages and demanding a declaration that his purported dismissal on 21 July 1994 was ultra vires and void. Writ was issued by […]
Fidelity Brokerage’s Investment Adviser Group has unveiled an investment management service. Visionplus is the only package dedicated to the financial adviser in the UK. It offers comprehensive client account information, email to Fidelity and on-screen trading at the touch of a button. The system links the user directly to Fidelity Brokerage’s in-house dealing system and […]
High Street firm Fisher Meredith is counting on a new computing package to transform the financial minefield of legal aid billing. The leading legal aid firm has teamed up with Dart Legal Systems to extend a practice management solution, Productivity Practice-wide for Lawyers (PPL), which is designed to “cope with the vagaries of the Legal […]
Allen & Overy acted for merchant bank Morgan Grenfell which provided leveraged senior debt facilities to NI Intressenter in its acquisition of Swedish industrial grinding company Naxos International. Allen & Overy also acted for Farnell Electronics which recently acquired Premier Industrial Corporation of the US.