Scent of war

Shots have been fired and battle lines drawn. The Law Society and the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) have engaged one another in war. At stake is the right
to regulate the legal profession.

The SRA is fighting to break free from the Law Society and become a completely independent regulator, while the Law Society insists that separating the two bodies will result in poorer professional standards.

The SRA's pushy stance was triggered on 30 November 2015, when the treasury announced a consultation would be launched in spring 2016 on 'making legal service regulators independent from their representative bodies'.

The Law Society's chief executive, Catherine Dixon, made Chancery Lane's position clear on 20 January, saying: 'We would have concerns about totally separating professional standards, including entry into the profession, from the profession itself.'

Paul Phillip, CEO of the SRA, hit back immediately and appealed to solicitors' back pockets as well as the fears of a government hell bent on cutting costs wherever possible.

At a press briefing following a board meeting on 20 January, Phillip said he would consider returning the Law Society's £35m cut of the practising certificate fee 'back to the profession', if the SRA became independent.

Not only did Chancery Lane dispute this figure, a statement from the society went further.

'We are disappointed that the SRA is seemingly seeking to undermine the solicitors' professional body and devalue its work. Perhaps this is an indication of the lack of value our regulator places on our profession,' it said.

But the SRA wasn't done yet. The regulator commissioned ComRes to conduct an independent survey on public perceptions of 'moving towards regulatory independence'.
The findings read like a script written by Phillip himself.

Of the 1,810 adults in England and Wales surveyed, 77 per cent supported government attempts to make the SRA fully independent, 68 per cent thought an independently regulated profession is more trustworthy, while only 6 per cent said solicitors should be self-regulated.

The endless sniping between the two has degraded the standard of debate on the issue - the whole thing reeks of two professional bodies fighting, not so much for the standards of the profession, but for their own stature and survival.

With the treasury's consultation due in the spring, it would be for the benefit of both
if the scent that descends on the profession is one of poppies and not gunpowder.

Who dares hold their breath? 

Binyamin Ali is the editor of Private Client Adviser