Solicitor and consumer opinion contributes to Law Society’s SRA proposal response

Solicitor and consumer opinion contributes to Law Society’s SRA proposal response

In response to the Solicitor’s Regulation Authority (SRA) consultation, the Law Society have published their own report based on their surveys of both consumers and Society members.

Released on the 1 June, the SRA’s ‘Look to the Future’ proposal reviewed the regulatory structure for solicitors and firms alike, including replacement of the existing Solicitor’s Code of Conduct with two separate codes for both of the entities with an aim to be shorter and simpler. Although the Society support some of the proposals underlying principles, they also highlight a lack of sufficient evidence which proves the current system requires drastic reform. Similarly, they contest that the resulting implications will lead to confusion for clients as opposed to meeting needs which currently lack attention. To form a response, they conducted surveys aiming to gather evidence in order a create a qualitative review of opinion.

Through gathering results from both solicitors and consumers, the Society aimed to gain a broad indication of the predicted impact the proposals would have from both those inside and outside of the legal profession.

The results collected on the proposed changes appear to indicate general disapproval from members of the Law Society. These range from solicitors to in-house legal advisers; 82% of which believed that the regulatory framework changes were unnecessary. The same percentage also believed giving permission to solicitors to work in unregulated firms would damage the brand of solicitors in general. 76% did not agree that solicitors should be allowed to provide unreserved legal services through unregulated entities in dealing with the public and 77% thought that firm level regulation should not only apply to a solicitor’s reserved work.

The proposals seemed to be met with similar opinions from the public. When asked about whether they believed that solicitor’s business should be regulated, 77% agreed with over half stating that they did so “strongly” (54%). Confidentiality of legal advice was also valued highly, with 97% of those asked ranking the privacy of their legal advice as important. 67% did not wish the opposing solicitor involved on their legal claim to be from the same firm and 50% felt that any money paid to the solicitor should be reserved for their case and not used for any other of the firm’s activity; 88% believed this was important overall.

Georgia Owen

Georgia is the Content Executive and will be your primary contact when submitting your latest news. While studying for an LLB at the University of Liverpool, Georgia gained experience working within retail, as well as social media management. She later went on to work for a local newspaper, before starting at Today’s Conveyancer.

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