Size, it seems, is everything. With the merger of Dibb Lupton Broomhead and Alsop Wilkinson making Dibb Lupton Alsop – now the largest firm in the North West in fee-earner numbers – the issue of critical mass remains one of the main considerations for success and survival in the legal market. The merger has excited […]
Heather Hallett QC has mounted a powerful bid to become the first female leader of the Bar Council. Hallett and Douglas Day QC, both senior criminal barristers, are the only contenders for the post of Bar Council vice-chair. Both are strong candidates, and both have been nominated by senior figures. But Hallett, as one of […]
Moves are under way in Ireland to bring judicial appointments in line with other areas of public life by fixing a seven-year non-renewable term for senior judges. The change is the most radical of the recommendations made by a courts commission set up by justice minister Nora Owen to devise a more efficient judicial system. […]
Top City law firms are likely to follow accountants in registering in Jersey under its new limited liability law, according to a lawyer who helped draft it. Mike Lombardi, partner at Jersey firm Ogier & Le Masurier, which helped one of the big six accountancy firms and the Jersey Parliament draft the law, said he […]
Pitmans of Reading has recruited another City lawyer in what it claims is its best-ever year. The firm, which has a policy of paying City rates to bring in good lawyers, has grown from six partners in 1990 to 15 partners. Irene Dallas, a partner with Herbert Smith for two-and-a-half years, joined Pitmans’ litigation department […]
Leigh Day & Co is taking up the cases of 40 lung-cancer victims on a “no win, no fee” basis, following the Legal Aid Board’s refusal to provide legal aid in July. In Britain’s first group action funded by a conditional fee arrangement, the victims seek to sue two tobacco firms – Imperial Tobacco and […]
Two separate initiatives encouraging law firms to implement “green” housekeeping policies kick off this month. The launch by the Environmental Law Foundation (ELF) of a new campaign to make lawyers more environmentally friendly coincides with the staging of a gala fundraising green dinner for leading members of the legal community. ELF has been awarded £12,600 […]
THE CHERISHED chambers tradition of posting boards displaying the names of their tenants outside their doors has ceased to be official Bar Council policy. The Bar Council voted through a resolution to drop the requirement that chambers must display the characteristic boards at its meeting last month. The move, passed with little controversy, has been […]
A question mark hangs over the future of the Brussels office of the Legal Resources Group following the merger of Alsop Wilkinson with Dibb Lupton Broomhead. Despite the merger, Alsops has asked to remain a member of the LRG, a group of five regional law firms that pool training, a legal research database and share […]
Law Society vice-president Phillip Sycamore and representatives of the Solicitors Association of Higher Court Advocates were due to meet on Monday to discuss their campaign to make it easier for solicitors to qualify as solicitor advocates. The group is due to discuss plans for training seats in advocacy departments to count towards the granting of […]
Ashurst Morris Crisp assigned a team of five partners and 11 assistants to advise Rupert Pennant-Rea’s National Publishing Group on the purchase of HMSO from the Government for £125m. Pennant-Rea, ex-deputy governor of the Bank of England, who resigned after details of his affair with a journalist were revealed in the press, is chair of […]
The prosecutions of the Maxwells have come to a conclusion that has disappointmented many, though the judgment of Mr Justice Buckley has won approval from most members of the profession. Apart from the ritualistic condemnation of the SFO by some commentators, what is pleasing is the constructive discussion now taking place with the aim of […]