LETR recommendation to scrap minimum CPD hours 'could be a challenge'

The recommendation in the Legal Education and Training Review report to do away with minimum CPD hours could be a challenge for smaller firm, SRA chair Charles Plant has said.

With 26 key recommendations ranging from managing the cost of entry into the legal profession to the possible voluntary certification of paralegals, the much-delayed report is the first to address the legal education and training for the sector as a whole since the 1996 report by the Lord Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Legal Education and Conduct (ACLEC).

Coming as part of a set of recommendations on CPD and continuing training which reflects on the "considerable cynicism and doubt" in relation to the effectiveness of current schemes, recommendation 17 sets out an alternative to the current hours-based CPD that should be measured in terms of personal outcomes.

"Models of CPD that require participants to plan, implement, evaluate and reflect annually on their training needs and their learning should be adopted where they are not already in place," the report says. "This approach may, but need not, prescribe minimum hours."

"We've have accepted that the current structure does not work well, and because it works very much on the basis of the prescribed minimum hours there no doubt the scheme can be abused," Mr Plant said.

In a departure from the current system, the proposal in the report is for individuals to set out their personal development objectives and link that to an outcome.

"The suggestion is that the firms themselves should spend more time supervising this and sastisfying themselves that the personal objectives of each solicitor is the right outcome for them," Plant said. "This is how it is done in other jurisdictions - it's very much linked to personal development plans with designated outcome that individuals can understand."

However, the former Herbert Smith partner said large City firms were probably better equipped at this stage to deal with the new flexible approach to CPD because they had dedicated in-house resources to set up and monitor compliance.

"There would always be several talks a week you could go to, but what the report recommends is that instead of focusing on accumulating hours, you should focus on your own personal development," he said.

How then, would the SRA go about ensuring that all firms and individuals have drawn up and meet their own plans?

"We cannot be overly prescriptive in this," Mr Plant replies. "We haven't got the resources to be checking out on this. One has got to proceed on the basis that people do want to develop in the areas that assist them in advancing their career and in providing clients with a good professional service."

By contrast, "it could be a challenge for smaller firms". "It is a cultural point;" he said. "I understand the predicament they're in but individuals have to appreciate that they will benefit from it".

Asked whether firms would not just default to the present hours-based system, Mr Plant said this approach could work, but only "as long as it is part of the personal development plan".