Archive

Warning signs

Are budget-driven cuts in care funding made by local authorities tantamount to institutional financial abuse? Lawrence Tudin reports

All legal services should be regulated, SRA says

The SRA has called for all legal services to be regulated. In its response to the LSB's consultation paper on the regulation of will writers, the SRA said the decisions made at the time of the Legal Services Act in 2007 had resulted in a “significantly unsatisfactory system of regulation”.

Jackson LJ backs Australian-style facilitators to control expert witness costs

Lord Justice Jackson has backed the use of 'facilitators' to control the cost of expert witnesses in complex civil litigation cases, such as construction or IT.

Rightmove founder to buy will writing and personal injury firms

In-Deed, the business set up by Rightmove founder Harry Hill to provide seamless property services including conveyancing, will expand into legal services such as will writing and personal injury as soon as alternative business structures legislation is in place, Solicitors Journal can reveal.

Mortgage rescue tenant cannot be evicted by housing association

A woman who rented her house back from a mutual housing association after struggling to pay the mortgage was a tenant and could not be evicted unless certain conditions were met, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled this morning.

Supreme Court awards female cohabitee 90 per cent of home's value

The Supreme Court has allowed the appeal by a former cohabitee that she should get 90 per cent of the former couple's home, restoring the trial judge's decision to depart from the traditional assumption that interest in the property should be split 50-50.

SRA unveils 'passport to practice' for global firms

The SRA is proposing to sweep away the old system of registering foreign offices of City-based global firms and bring in a single 'international passport to practice'.

Supreme Court patent ruling 'brings UK closer to Europe'

A ruling by the Supreme Court on the validity of a patent protecting a gene sequence used in a new drug aimed at tackling the auto-immune disease lupus has brought UK laws closer to those used by other states in European Patent Convention.