The Law Society of Saskatechewan has announced that the Government of Saskatchewan has repealed emergency regulations surrounding remote execution and witnessing of documents electronically and replaced them with permanent rule changes, which will extend beyond the period of public emergency. The rule changes come about in the light of the increased efficiency and lower cost…
Arizona to Allow Non-Lawyer Ownership
The Arizona Supreme Court has approved rule changes allowing for non-lawyer ownership of law firms in the state. The rule change comes in the wake of the two-year sandbox announced in Utah, however, the Arizona courts went one step further, opting to make the changes permanent. The recommendations for the rule change were first proposed…
Accountancy Body to Hand Designated Legal Regulatory Powers to CILEx
The Association of Chartered Accountants (ACCA) in England and Wales is to withdraw from legal services regulation in a UK first. The legal activities that are exercised by its members will now be regulated in a new partnership by CILEx Regulation (CRL), the regulatory body for Chartered Legal Executives. Under the Legal Services Act 2007…
Utah to be First US State to Trial Non-Lawyer Ownership
Utah has become the first state in the US to allow non-lawyer ownership of legal services providers. This month the State Supreme Court unanimously voted in favour of approving a 2-year sandbox programme which would licence new forms of legal services ownership. The move has come about in the face of continued concerns over access…
Philippines authorises video notarization in quarantined areas
The Philippines Supreme Court has released updated rules that allow video conferencing software to be used for the notarization of documents in areas under quarantine due to public health concerns. The authorisation is contained in A.M. No. 20-07-04-SC, otherwise known as the 2020 Interim Rules on Remote Notarization of Paper Documents. The Rules shall be limited…
The future of legal services in England and Wales – reviewing regulation, consumer protection and responding to innovation
Tuesday, 15th September 2020 Online Leader of the review Professor Stephen Mayson, Centre for Ethics & Law, UCL is a keynote speaker at this conference. The report makes recommendations for the future of legal services, including: a single independent regulator for the legal sector – the Legal Services Regulation Authority – to replace the current arrangement…
LSB plans to review regulatory structure
A paper by Steve Brooker, head of policy development and research at the Legal Services Board, released on the 4th of June, has suggested that the LSB should review the regulatory structure, including the reserved legal activities within its current powers. The report comes in the wake of indications from the UK’s Ministry of Justice…
Mayson Report: Final report published
The highly anticipated denouement of the Independent Review of Legal Services, which was first launched in October 2018, was published on the 11th June. The 340-page report which has been informed by a number of working papers, as well as an interim report, which has been fed into by a variety of actors in the…
Two COVID-19 Lessons that Were Long Overdue to Kenya’s Justice Sector
Abstract The two decisions made by policymakers in Kenya’s because of COVID-19 were timely but were bound to happen. they are direct economic benefits for reducing the prison population and use of technology in courts. If the Prison population is reduced at least by 10%, the prison population will reduce by 22,372 prisoners. Using the…
Law Society of New South Wales welcomes electronic witnessing of legal documents
Richard Harvey, President of the Law Society of New South Wales, has welcomed changes implemented by the NSW government and Attorney General, allowing for electronic witnessing of legal documents. The move has come about as a temporary reaction to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, and has been added to the Electronic Transactions Regulation 2017. Mr Harvey…