Sarah Angell took the plunge to become a sole practitioner and hasn’t looked back The future of sole practice is bleak, or so I was told when contemplating setting up practice four years ago. “You are brave,” people kept saying. However, this negative attitude made me more determined to achieve my goals. The classic comment […]
OFFICIAL Referee (OR) Court lawyers could lose the right to call their own expert witnesses if proposals by OR judges to have their own court-appointed experts are accepted by the Government. The OR judges, who hear high-value technical cases in construction, engineering and environmental law, anticipate disagreement among lawyers over their proposals but argue that […]
Do sole practitioners have a future? My short answer is “Yes”, but with qualifications. The first is that the profession is becoming an increasingly crowded place. This puts pressure on all those in firms to justify their position by achieving billing targets. Some have almost certainly decided to take up sole practice rather than continue […]
Tim Miller reports on the increasing number of sole practitioners who meet kindred spirits in legal networks The joys of working alone – independence, flexibility, and control. But lawyers know that life as a sole practitioner comes at a cost. Overheads cannot be shared, support staff are thin on the ground and office politics may […]
SOLICITOR advocates meet the Lord Chancellor this week to put their case for wearing wigs. The Solicitors’ Association of Higher Court Advocates and the Criminal Lawyers Solicitors Association are calling for court-room equality. But some senior members of the Bar remain opposed to any change which would erode barristers’ distinctive dress. Lord Mackay issued a […]
CITY-BASED McKenna & Co is set to launch a national link-up with scores of regional firms. Details are soon to be released about a new association with the 70 member firms of Lawnet. McKennas has acted in a consultancy role for firms in the network for some time, but the new link-up will be on […]
DIRECTOR of the Solicitors Complaints Bureau Veronica Lowe this week presents a radical report on the future of complaints-handling within the profession. The SCB’s management team has set in motion ‘Quo Vadis?’ – a wide-ranging review to tackle the issue of how solicitors will deal with complaints into the next decade. “There are no sacred […]
MCKENNA & Co partner Richard Burnett-Hall has defected to Bristows Cooke & Carpmael, where he will establish an environmental law service to business clients and other law firms. Burnett-Hall, an environmental law expert, says he decided to move in order to go to a smaller firm where he could develop a specialist niche practice. He […]
Gershon, a commercial property specialist at Eversheds Birmingham, will host the association’s national conference in the city this autumn. She emphasises that the association’s 500-plus membership encompasses most property-related disciplines. She says: “Far from being a group of ardent feminists intent on using the association for political or sexist purposes, it provides a forum for […]
The Solicitors European Group is holding its annual Lord Fletcher Memorial Lecture at the Law Society next month. Lord Lester of Herne Hill QC will speak on Human Rights – Towards the Year 2000 in the Society Hall at 6.30pm on 16 February. The lecture is open to all members of the legal profession, trainee […]
Arnold Rosen believes that the Sole Practioners Group still has some way to go before it is able to achieve its goals The Sole Practitioners Group has the unenviable task of clubbing the unclubbable. Tim Miller examines the problems it faces The Sole Practitioners Steering Group was founded by me with the support of 14 […]
Former England cricket captain Mike Gatting is heading for the High Court with libel complaints over a biography of fellow cricketer Imran Khan. Gatting claims passages in the book, called ‘Imran Khan’ could be taken as indicating he was racially prejudiced and says they also cast a slur on his sense of sportsmanship, honour and […]