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For older (archived) "New" items, from 2008, please see
New from 2008.
Last updated on July 1st 2009.
Events for your diary
the SOLICITORS Group are providing two events in the Autumn:
* Law Autumn Olympia 2009 will take place on 29th & 30th September 2009 and
* Law Autumn NEC 2009 will take place on 14th & 15th October 2009.
The events provide an opportunity to obtain CPD and also to see the latest products
and services available to lawyers.
The Incorporated Council of Law Reporting are providing
their (almost free) annual lecture on Monday 19th October at 6 p.m. in the Great Hall of Lincoln's Inn.
The Speaker is Lord Walker of Gestlingthorpe and the topic is "Loss of a Chance and a Chance of Loss".
Cost is £5 or free to law students and similar, and attendance can provide 1 hour's CPD from the Bar Standards Board.
Last updated on June 25th 2009.
Latest legal blog
Plan-it Law is a new blog from Cambridge firm
Mills & Reeve. Members of the planning team
discuss current real estate related issues and other topical planning law questions.
There are substantial "meaty" posts on a regular basis.
Last updated on June 18th 2009.
Rio Tinto deal heralds huge changes
is an article by Richard Susskind in the Times today. The international mining group has concluded a deal with
CPA Global,
a leading outsourcing provider of legal services, and expects savings on its legal costs of up to 20 per cent.
Richard Susskind sees this as a portent of an irreversible trend in the legal sector.
How is the recession hitting IT spending for law firms? Here is a selection of the recent press releases I have received!
- Iris tell me that 282 law practices have joined the Iris Legal family as new customers during the twelve months
up to 30th April 2009. They already have 5,500 legal organisations (firms of solicitors, barristers chambers and coroners) as users.
They have a 95% customer retention rate which is among the highest in the industry.
They are currently investing millions of pounds in further developing their software for both the larger Enterprise firm
and smaller high street practices.
- Eclipse tell me about their latest new customer, progressive,
multi-disciplinary law firm, Lees Solicitors LLP. They provide a range of services
for private and commercial clients, and employ over 100 staff across its offices in Merseyside.
They have selected Eclipse’s Proclaim Practice Management software solution.
The Proclaim software from Eclipse is in use by around 10,000 professionals dealing with a vast range of work areas and
last year, Proclaim won the Legal Technology Award for 'Integrated System of the Year'.
- SOS tell me that Windeatts Solicitors of South Devon is standardising
on SOS Connect which will replace the firm’s AIM system in Totnes and Peapod system in Kingsbridge in a major re-structuring
and modernisation of the law firm’s IT. SOS has 400 clients and a 20 year pedigree. SOS Connect provides high
levels of process automation with flexibility for lawyers to create and control their own work flows.
The Virtual Practices division for smaller firms delivers all the benefits of SOS Connect as a fully-hosted solution
together with an outsourced
legal cashiering service.
- Linetime tell me that a further three legal firms have purchased Liberate DebtimeSQL,
their Microsoft SQLServer based debt recovery and litigation package.
Linetime have, in conjunction with many of the leading UK debt recovery practices, been developing debt recovery software
since 1990 and the software includes special features like variable rate interest calculators, payment allocation profiling,
the ability to handle multiple debtors per debt, a sophisticated billing engine, installment & arrears management,
client web access module and links to outside services such as PCOL.
Last updated on June 17th 2009.
Stephen Mason is a barrister, an accredited mediator and an IT expert, with a particular expertise in
electronic signatures.
He reports, on his site, on the legal issues involved with the
first PIN ATM case to go to trial (he is representing one of the parties).
There is extensive information on
electronic signatures on his site, including books, reports,
legislation and cases - a valuable and unique resource.
He has written one of the key books on this subject himself -
Electronic Signatures in Law (Tottel, 2nd edition, 2007).
Law and More continues to develop strongly as a "life style" site for lawyers.
The site is strong on employment and jobs opportunities, reflecting the previous skills and professions of
several of the key innovators at the site. The "enjoyment" section is strong too, covering many consumer
products and services related to travel and entertainment suitable for (supposedly) prosperous lawyers with wide interests.
Last updated on June 16th 2009.
Brief Counsel Ltd is a new service in the Irish legal services
marketplace that helps Irish solicitors select and manage Irish barristers.
The company (set up by a barrister and an Ernst & Young Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year winner) finds solicitors
the most appropriate barrister for their case from all 2,100-plus barristers currently practicing in Ireland.
The company can get competitive tenders from multiple barristers, find the best barrister for the fee proposed
by the solicitor, and guarantee service standards such as deadlines for written work by counsel. The company’s services,
which are free of charge for solicitors, are complementary to those of the Law Library and have been operating successfully
since 2008 on a pilot basis with selected solicitors and barristers before going public recently following regulatory
clearance for the business. Brief Counsel Ltd says that it is always happy to hear from non-Irish lawyers and
professional clients seeking the services of Irish barristers.
Last updated on June 15th 2009.
Solicitors Online Blog is a blog about Solicitors
using the Internet from Tessa Shepperson. Tessa has run part of her own practice online in the form of
Landlord-Law since 2001, which has given her
a great deal of common sense experience of what works, and what does not work.
She now also offers a consultancy service, to help other solicitors provide services online - but this blog
provides lots of her good ideas and wisdom online, for free. Have a look at her site as well - you will see
many of her ideas worked out in an attractive and viewer-friendly form.
Last updated on June 11th 2009.
This comes from a story in the Law Society Gazette of 4th June
Wikipedia's List of largest UK law firms
covers the top 100 in considerable detail. As with all Wikipedia entries, anyone can edit an entry and so the article
is saying that law firms should take this seriously and edit their own entry, taking care to keep it up to date and also
to provide the right style (not too pushy and marketing driven), the right length (not too short and not too long), informative
without being boring.... and so on. Food for thought there. Note that you get to his Wikipedia section more or less
at the top of the page from doing a
Google on "UK Law firms" and doubtless many other combinations of the key words.
Latest legal blog - could be amusing!
A trainee writes is a new blog from a trainee in a medium/large firm in Scotland.
It's written by a brand new shiny trainee, now 2 weeks into the job. As the blogger says "Finally I've made it to being a
trainee... after years (and a fortune) studying I've earned the title of "unqualified assistant"... at least for a while."
Last updated on May 26th 2009.
An initiative to help landlords and tenants respond to a government consultation paper
An online answerform has been produced by
Landlord-Law (run by solicitor Tessa Shepperson) to allow people to
respond easily to the Communities
and Local Governments consultation paper 'The private rented sector : professionalism and quality, The Government
response to the Rugg Review' (which proposes licensing of landlords and regulation of letting agents). The text
of the consultation paper (which is fairly short at 37 pages) has been largely reproduced, with fields to allow
the viewer to answer in context. All answers submitted will be forwarded to the relevant government department by Landlord-Law.
Last updated on May 22nd 2009.
Merrill Legal Solutions has brought in an alternative product
to LiveNote to meet different user requirements. The new product is called LegalCraft Transcend and has been
developed by a company called
LegalCraft working closely with the Merrill team. Both products provide users with a real-time feed of proceedings,
allowing users to annotate, report and search through transcripts both in real-time and off-line. The newer product Transend has
additional features including a tabbed user interface making it possible to switch between documents, an
auto-scroll for historic transcripts and a full screen view for users less likely to annotate the transcript. The software
works in a wireless environment and can run under Windows Vista.
Last updated on May 20th 2009.
Two new blogs from Pannone
Employment blog and
Family Law Blog.
Law-Now is the free online information service for businesses from
CMS Cameron McKenna. Law-Now, which covers both national and international legal topics,
can be viewed online or taken as a
personalised email service - there are around 30,000 subscribers to this service. With a recent relaunch
of the CMS Cameron McKenna website, Law-Now is much more tightly integrated with the firm's site - previously,
it had been possible to access Law-Now without being really quite sure where it came from. Now the two
sites are closely linked both ways - which is sensible really.
Last updated on May 18th 2009.
LexCSS.com is USA-based site showcasing lawyer website designs.
The purpose of the site is to inspire the legal community to continue improving the design and usability of its websites.
Users can rate designs, add comments or submit a website for consideration. Glasgow based solicitors,
Inksters has become the first non-US law firm
to have their website listed (at the moment it is in the top left position marked "New").
Being on this site is quite an achievement for Inksters who have recently redesigned their
site to offer several new facilities including videos and podcasts, using Twitter to tell potential house purchasers about new properties
coming on the market, enabling house hunters to note interest online, allowing clients to pay online, and giving visitors a
chance to win an Apple iPod nano. There is also a good strong design and frequently changing news on the home page.
LawComms specialises in marketing communications for barristers and is led by
long time legal IT and marketing expert
Gerald Newman.
He has now published three new free downloadable guides to explain the why, when, and how of E-marketing and Search Engine Optimisation.
Although aimed primarily at barristers, the detailed practical guides will also benefit High Street solicitors' practices.
Here are the three free guides which you can download:
Last updated on May 15th 2009.
European Commission imposes €1.06bn fine on Intel - information from Law-Now, CMS Cameron McKenna's online news information service
Law-Now reports as follows:
On 13 May 2009 the European Commission confirmed it has imposed a fine of €1.06bn on Intel for abusing its dominant
position on the market for x86 CPU (central processing unit) computer chips from October 2002 to December 2007.
This is the first time the European Commission has in a single decision imposed a fine over €1 billion for breach
of the EU competition rules and dwarfs the €497.2 million fine imposed on Microsoft in March 2004 for its abuse of
dominance in the PC operating systems market (although Microsoft was fined substantial additional amounts for failure
to comply with this decision).
For the full article, see
Law-Now.
Last updated on May 14th 2009.
Proposed merger of
Inner Temple Library and
Middle Temple Library....
The Executive Committees of
Inner Temple and
Middle Temple have agreed to commission a feasibility study to
investigate the potential benefits of merging their Libraries and creating a Joint Education and Advocacy Centre.
Both Inns incur substantial running costs in maintaining their library. Improvements in technology and the availability
of on-line services have resulted in less dependence on large paper collections and usage of each library has diminished
as a result. The study will determine whether or nor a merged library is feasible and, if it is, it will identify what
facilities and services it should provide to meet the demands of users in the modern age. The aim would be to improve
facilities and provide an excellent library for the whole Temple community and one, which would attract students as well as barristers.
The results of the study are likely in the late summer and no decisions are anticipated until much later
in the year after full consultation with staff and consideration by the relevant Inn Committees, Bench Table and Parliament.
See also
news with information on how to comment on the proposals.
Last updated on May 13th 2009.
Three free or low cost seminars on IT/marketing/dataprotection/software topics....
ebizlaw surgery: Data Protection in a Nutshell
Venue: Fox Williams LLP premises, Ten Dominion Street, London EC2
Date: 6.30 p.m. 20 May 2009, beer and wine provided
Cost: free but you must register - email koliver@foxwilliams.com.
Summary: Answering questions like "What are the key legal considerations under the Data Protection Act and what do I need to do to comply?",
"What is legal best practice in e-marketing?" and
"What are the main privacy concerns with operating a business and how should these be addressed?".
Online Branding - An Internet Lawyer's Guide to Building and Protecting your Business on the Web
Presented by Shireen Smith, Solicitor and founder of Azrights. Shireen specialises in intellectual property and internet law.
Venue: British Library, Business and Intellectual Property Centre
Date: 2-5pm 24 June, 2009
Cost: £30 plus VAT
Summary: This course looks at the legal and business issues involved in extending your brand online to help you make an informed choice before you
commission any work and also covers topics like "Google AdWords vs. Free Search Engine Rankings".
How to use integrated .NET technology for practice efficiency presented by DPS.
Date: 22nd July, 9 30am to 16 30pm
Venue: Microsoft - Cardinal Place, London SW1E
Cost: free but you need to register with Eleanor Howell
Summary: This day of seminars will introduce .NET technology for today's law firms. Topics to be discussed include, .NET
strategies and how they have benefitted real law firms, .NET technology and integration with MS Outlook, and how your firm can
utilise the latest innovations in .NET technology.
Last updated on May 9th 2009.
The Legal Services Board is the
new, independent body responsible for overseeing the regulation of lawyers in England and Wales.
They were created by the Legal Services Act 2007 with the goal of "reforming and modernising the
legal services market place by putting the interests of consumers at the heart of the system".
The act built on much of the earlier work of Sir David Clementi in examining the role of the
regulators and the legal profession.
The Legal Services Board now shares the regulatory function with eight ‘Approved Regulators’ of the legal profession,
each of which have direct responsibility for the day-to-day regulation of the different types of lawyers.
- Solicitors: Law Society, Solicitors Regulation Authority (independent regulatory body of the Law Society) and
Legal Complaints Service (independent complaints handling body for the Law Society)
- Barristers: Bar Council and Bar Standards Board (independent regulatory arm of the Bar Council)
- Legal Executives: Institute of Legal Executives and ILEX Professional Standards Board (independent regulatory arm of the Institute of Legal Executives)
- Licensed Conveyancers: Council for Licensed Conveyancers (regulatory body for Licensed Conveyancers)
(For links to these bodies, see
here.)
Which? Legal Service
will shortly be launching a will writing and checking service called Which Wills?. This will be an online
service involving the customer completing a "simple but comprehensive online questionnaire" which tailors
the will to the person's particular circumstances. According to a report in the Law Gazette, the service involves a
tie-in with solicitors firm Blake Lapthorn and will involve a solicitor checking the will before sending it to the customer.
There will also apparently be a "jargon-free summary in plain English". Testing is continuing during May
ready for a soft launch. The cost will be £89 for a single will or £129 for a mirror will.
Last updated on May 6th 2009.
Richard Susskind
is interviewed, in this webcast, by Mark Harding, Global General Counsel at Barclays, about his new book "The End of Lawyers?".
The interview lasts nearly 50 minutes but you can choose the sections of most interest to you:
Market predictions and changes - technology and commoditisation
Law firm management - new approaches for the future
Innovation and R&D - rethinking the delivery of legal services
Change management for clients - new ways of working
Market competition and external investment
Collaboration - more for less
Developments in technology to support risk management
Implications of emerging technologies for access of justice
Future trends and opportunities for lawyers
To see more about the book, or to buy it, visit
OUP.
I have recently been reviewing and updating my pages
Chambers Offering Significant Legal Resources Online and
Individual Barristers Offering Significant Legal Resources. There is
lots of useful material out there created by hard working barristers, just waiting for you to look at it!
Last updated on May 1st 2009.
I have commented before on the two important sites offered by Neil Addison, of Palmyra Chambers in Warrington, Cheshire:
* Harassment Law covers all topics related to harassment.
There are sections on stalking, malicious communications, racial, sexual, religious
or cultural harassment, harassment at work and anti-social behaviour (including neighbours from hell).
There are links to relevant legislation and sources of training and assistance.
* Religion Law UK is designed to provide practical
information and relevant web links on the subject of
Religion and the Law today. He covers the law relating to criminal and also civil situations where religion is
involved and also has sections for case law relevant to religion, with links to the judgments
if they are available. There are also reports and articles, a section on international declarations
and a very comprehensive set of links to religious bodies under headings of
Legal, Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish, Eastern and General.
* He now also offers a
Religion Law blog with comments on cases and
religion law issues. He makes the distinction that the Religion Law Website site contains information
rather than comment but that the blog enables him to provide his personal viewes.
Recent posts include "What do we mean by ‘A Secular Society’" and
"How do you solve a problem like Sharia?" - both major essays on the topics concerned.
Last updated on April 25th 2009.
CLA have relaunched their site - worth another look
Community Legal Advice (previously called
Community Legal Service Direct or CLS Direct) provides free information, help and advice direct to the public on a
range of common legal issues and also offers a national helpline (0845 345 4 345). Links are provided to approved
information providers, including but not limited to solicitors, under the appropriate topic. There are also the CLS Legal Information Leaflets,
which can be printed from the site. These were produced by the Consumer Association and cover key areas of the civil
law of England and Wales, such as Employment Law, Welfare Benefits and Debt. The viewer can also use an online
calculator to see if they qualify for legal aid. The site is clear and easy to use and is also available in
many community languages.
Last updated on April 24th 2009.
Casecheck, a key provider of (free) online case summaries
in Scotland, has linked up with
Law Brief Publishing to give users free access to a database of
more than 5,000 case summaries from the UK and EU.
Casecheck now covers all major areas of law across the UK and EU, and includes
expert opinions covering a wide variety of specialist subjects.
Around 50% of Scotland’s 10,000 lawyers are regular CaseCheck users.
Law Brief Update is a free email newsletter which provides a brief introduction to recent
case law in all the major areas of law. It is written by around 20 specialist barristers,
and goes out approximately once a month.
Last updated on April 14th 2009.
Bankruptcy, insolvencey and corporate rescue
is a blog from John Tribe, KPMG Lecturer in Restructuring, Kingston Law School, Kingston University, Surrey.
The blog supports his insolvency law and company law teaching and scholarship and provides "an online notepad"
where he can record important developments, news and other items of interest. There is also a mass of information
available with links to relevant bodies, events and other web sites in the area.
Last updated on April 4th 2009.
Malcolm Johnson & Co, of Surbiton, Surrey, is a firm of specialist child
abuse solicitors. They provide over 300 pages of legal information on their site,
made up of case reports and synopses that they have written as well as notes on relevant statutes, both historical
and current. They are developing the statute and case law database as a real resource for students and
practitioners working in this difficult area.
Last updated on April 3rd 2009.
Blog news
The author of BabyBarista ("Pupil
barrister making coffee for the rich and famous") has been revealed by Times Online
here as
Tim Kevan, a barrister who practiced at 1 Temple Gardens for nine years before leaving the Bar to write full-time.
Tim acknowledges that he is the author
here.
Apparently, Tim is now bringing out a book based on the blog called BabyBarista and The Art of War (Bloomsbury)
which centres around BabyB’s first year in chambers where he is fighting his fellow pupils for the coveted prize of a permanent tenancy.
Still on the subject of blogs, not new, but the biggest and best legal current awareness blog....
Current Awareness from the Inner Temple Library
provides a blog of up-to-date information regarding new case law, changes in legislation, and legal news,
which Library Staff think will be of interest to lawyers practising in the UK. The content is selected and updated daily
by information professionals from the Inner Temple Library in London with full links to the original source of the
information. There are usually many entries on any one day. This is a major current awareness resource.
It is also noteworthy that the blog makes full use of the powers built into blogging software with the archive of
past posts; e.g. (for just "A"!) abortion, adoption, advertising, advocacy, age discrimination, agency, agricultural holdings,
air passenger duty, airlines, alcohol abuse, animals, anonymity, appeals, arbitration, armed forces,
artificial insemination, ASBOs, assault, assets recovery, assisted suicide, asylum and attorney general..... and so on.
Last updated on April 1st 2009.
Twitter has finally made it!
The Guardian has announced
that it will become the first newspaper in the world to be published exclusively via Twitter, the sensationally popular social
networking service that has transformed online communication.
The move, described as "epochal" by media commentators, will see all Guardian content tailored to fit the format of Twitter's
brief text messages, known as "tweets", which are limited to 140 characters each.
A mammoth project is also under way to rewrite the whole of the newspaper's archive, stretching back to 1821, in the form of tweets.
Sceptics have expressed concerns that 140 characters may be insufficient to capture the full breadth of meaningful human activity,
but social media experts say the spread of Twitter encourages brevity, and that it ought to be possible to convey the gist of any message in a tweet.
Last updated on March 30th 2009.
News from the legal software world
DPS Software is taking over
Access Legal Systems.
Access Legal Systems is a very long standing and well respected supplier of mainly accounts system to firms of
solicitors with around 100 users and this will be a valuable addition to DPS' customer base at a time when the whole legal
software supplier market is changing (merging and being taken over by other firms).
Osman Ismail, Managing Director of DPS Software says "This is great news for both Access and DPS clients. DPS have acquired a terrific
product, which is supported by an excellent team of staff. We are committed to supporting the development of the product and staff alike."
Last updated on March 19th 2009.
This is the first blog from a chambers (as distinct from an individual barrister)
Panopticon a new blog about Information Law maintained by members of 11KBW’s
Information Law Practice Group. Information law is about the right to know, the right to keep private and the
boundary between those rights. It encompasses areas such as data protection, freedom of information, the protection of private information
under article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, breach of confidence, and the regulation of surveillance.
The name apparently comes from Jeremy Bentham’s proposed new model prison, in which constant surveillance
would be a tool for moral regeneration; it has become an enduring metaphor in debates about the benefits and the dangers of systematic
information-gathering. The blog is still rather new - but it looks interesting!
Last updated on March 18th 2009.
Inksters list Property for Sale on Twitter
The Glasgow Law firm
Inksters Solicitors have enhanced their presence on Twitter by adding two property listings
to complement their two property websites
Scotsproperty.com and
Shetlandproperty.com.
Now twitterers can follow property for sale via Inksters at
www.twitter.com/scotsproperty and
www.twitter.com/shetlandhomes.
Inksters believe that when they began microblogging last month at
www.twitter.com/inksters they may well have become the first Scottish law firm on Twitter.
Brian Inkster of Inksters said "I see Twitter as a natural progression in the use of modern
technology to communicate with our clients and prospective clients. Now users of Twitter can also keep an eye on what
properties Inksters are selling and any change in the status of those properties."
Last updated on March 12th 2009.
Latest legal resource provided by a chambers
The Landmark Chambers Centre for Environmental Law
offers podcasts, articles and training courses on the latest developments from the UK's leading barristers'
chambers in environmental and planning law. Details of the regular seminars and other events held by the
Centre are posted on the site regularly."
Last updated on March 9th 2009.
Morgan McManus - Clones, Co. Monaghan and Enniskillen, Co.Fermanagh
(so, practising both sides of the border)
have developed a specialist site on Accident Claims Law and employment law claims.
This is not "just" a site about making a claim but deals with such claims from the perspective of both the Plaintiff
and the Defendant (the Claimant and the Respondent), the employer and the employee and all other persons who have
an interest in ensuring that they are fully informed when they are faced with claims of this nature.
This website will be of benefit to a Respondent who is being sued, to the employer who faces a personal injury
claim in respect of a factory accident and the employer who is obliged to deal with a grievance or disciplinary
matter in the workplace.
Last updated on March 1st 2009.
New topic for a specialised web site
Prenuptial Agreement UK is a new web site from solicitors
Silverman Sherliker that tells the viewer everything they need to know about having
a prenuptial agreement, including what benefits an agreement can bring, legal pitfalls to avoid,
UK case law involving prenuptial agreements, the current UK legal position on prenuptial agreements and the likely
cost of getting a suitable agreement drawn up. There is a facility on the site to ask for free initial advice.
Last updated on February 27th 2009.
The Law Society Library Online
has received the 2008 Halsbury's Award for Best
Legal Information Service (Non-Commercial Sector) by the British and Irish Association of Law Librarians (BIALL).
The library project is a joint
venture between the Law Society and LexisNexis and replaces Catalyst, the previous Law Society
library catalogue and indexes.
The new service includes a Queries and Enquiries Database of over 4,000 records,
an English Cases Index case citator updated on a daily basis,
a Commencement Index (an index to UK statutes going back to 1974),
updates on EU legislation and free access to a monthly e-mail alert from LexisNexis.
Daniel Barnett, a barrister at 1 Temple Gardens
specialising in employment law and associated commercial disputes, has launched his new site.
Daniel established the Employment Law Mailing List which is a free email bulletin
containing new legislation and important employment law cases - typically two or
three emails are sent out each week. You can sign up on the site.
So what's unusual about that, you may ask - there are lots of free
email bulletins around. Not many as well subscribed as this one however - over 22,000 people now receive
the bulletins, including judges, tribunal members, barristers, solicitors,
in-house lawyers, HR professionals, academics, journalists and union officials.
He is also about to publish a book called "Intelligent Marketing for Employment Lawyers" (a "real" book not just online)
which will come out in
May or June and will be marketed exclusively through his website and email bulletins, as well as via twitter and blogs.
It focuses on marketing of all types - "traditional" and internet-based - and it looks intereting.
Last updated on February 24th 2009.
Two key independent suppliers working together to provide good value services for their clients
Words4Business, the leading supplier of web content, articles and
newsletters for firms of solicitors in England and Wales are now giving all their clients a year's free membership of
360 Legal Group, a membership organisation providing products and
services to enable law firms to continuously improve their firms as businesses. This special promotion
provides substantial savings to the firms taking advantage of it.
Words4Business have also negotiated special discounts for training for their clients and are paying the
cost of the first 360 training course booked by new clients until 30 April.
For more information, contact Joe Reevy on 01392 423607.
Last updated on February 23rd 2009.
Wiki Mental Health now provides a CPD scheme
Wiki Mental Health is an internet resource on mental
health law in England & Wales, primarily for mental health practitioners, to which anyone can contribute.
There are three sections to this website:
i) Caselaw; regularly updated commentaries on the cases, with links to the full text judgments on Bailii.
(Bailii contains nearly every judgment, but no specific commentary.)
ii) Legislation; The full text of, and a simple and up-to-date commentary on, the Mental Health Act 1983, the Mental Capacity Act 2005, and related legislation.
iii) General articles to explain the concepts and terminology used in the caselaw and legislation sections and practical guidance for lawyers.
The site has been set up by
a mental health solicitor. There is now also a SRA-accredited CPD scheme based on the information on the site.
Each month there is a multiple-choice questionnaire based on the updates made to the site that month.
The CPD scheme is £50 per annum, and can earn a solicitor 12 points.
Last updated on February 19th 2009.
JUSTICE is once again running a one-day conference -
entitled Human Rights, Civil Liberties and Democracy - for law students, pupils and trainees. It's at Freshfields
in London on Saturday 14 March. Cost is just £10 (or £5 to JUSTICE student members).
Keynote speaker is Helena Kennedy QC, chair of JUSTICE Council, and there will be other sessions on:
· counter-terrorism
· fair trial
· the constitution
· a British bill of rights
· careers in human rights
See the
student section for more information and to download a pdf flyer for the event.
Employment Litigator Online comes from
Gary David Armstrong, a UK Employment Lawyer working in Manchester. The blog is designed for
"all those interested in Employment Law and its development domestically and internationally".
There are regular and quite detailed case reports from significant recent judgments
particularly from the Employment Appeal Tribunal.
Last updated on February 18th 2009.
How good is your practice?
LawPractice Consultancy.com is a new consultancy based
on firms meeting the particular challenges of the present financial situation. The key person, Joanathan Edwards,
was Managing Partner of Golds Solicitors for 16 years. The site is providing an "Interactive Practice Analysis",
a free system for practices to use based on answering a series of (quite detailed) questions online.
The answers are scored against standards and the firm receives an individual analysis.
(No financial questions are asked which Jonathan realises that most firms would not be prepared to provide).
It is free and will undoubtedly "make you think" even if you do not agree with the results!
Last updated on February 16th 2009.
Money Laundering
The Law Society
has highlighted the heavy compliance burdens placed on solicitors as a result of the anti-money laundering regime
which applies in the UK and across Europe.
Responding to a call for evidence, the Society has encouraged the House of Lords home affairs subcommittee
to seek a comprehensive examination of the costs and benefits resulting from the regime.
The Law Society has drawn to the committee's attention the fact that no detailed cost/benefit analysis
has been undertaken into the effectiveness of either the Financial Action Task Force's recommendations,
various European Directives or the UK anti-money laundering regimes.
Evidence from solicitors strongly suggests that the regulated sector is spending significantly more on
compliance than the UK government is recovering in criminal property.
In the face of this apparent lack of proportionality, the Law Society has recommended that:
i) Governments and international policy agencies should develop a framework to adequately assess the
effectiveness of anti-money laundering regimes.
ii) Governments need to review the effectiveness of their anti-money laundering regimes and look at
proportionate ways to reduce the burden on the private sector and to increase the amount of criminal property
recovered and criminal activity disrupted.
iii) Law enforcement agencies and anti-money laundering policy agencies need to continue to provide the private
sector with information about money laundering and terrorist financing. This will help the private sector
to better understand the warning signs and to comply with their obligations.
The evidence that the Law Society prepared (PDF, 115Kb) for the House of Lords Select Committee on the European Union
– sub committee F (Home Affairs) can be found
here.
Insite Law Magazine provides a varied and
interesting selection of daily online law news items and law blogs.
Last updated on February 13th 2009.
Interesting use of a wiki
WikiJob is a careers advice website for students and graduates
interested in finding out about top careers, jobs and discussing interview processes at law,
finance & accountancy firms in the UK. The site has been designed to let students and graduates find
out what careers, employers and interviews are really like. It is the first candidate focused graduate recruitment
website and the largest graduate job search community on the internet.
WikiJob helps candidates find out what they really want to know about employers, and puts the power in their
hands to tell other people what they think too.
WikiJob's Wiki profiles are open for anyone to edit, which means the information inside them has
been written by both candidates and companies.
It is nice to know that some firms are still investing in their facilities for conveyancing!
newhome-solicitor.com is a new site from
Elliot Mather, of Chesterfield, Mansfield & Matlock, in Derbyshire,
which provides a great deal of information on the conveyancing process
and also allows the viewer to obtain an instant online quotation.
Last updated on February 10th 2009.
Legal Costs Blog comes from Gibbs Wyatt Stone,
Defendant Costs Specialists. The blog covers the expertise expected from specialist
costs counsel and the range of services provided by traditional costs draftsmen. Although the blog has only
just been launched, it includes archive material from the last 2 years, previously covered on the
Costs Law site. There is also a Costs Law update to which you
can subscribe on the site.
Last updated on February 8th.
The CMS Cameron McKenna site Law Now is a very valuable free
resource for lawyers interested in IT topics. Their
Technology Annual Review is now available
to download. this is a substantial (40 page) pdf document with short, well laid-out articles on topics of
interest over the last year, presented on a month-by-month basis. Topics in this year’s Review include:
age ratings; CCTV rules; domain names; search engine keywords; software patents; myspace.co.uk; LinkedIn;
Facebook; unfair commercial practices; new gTLDs; the Freedom of Information Act (and others).
At the back of the Review, they have included three detailed articles on legal issues relating to Google’s
Adwords, green technology, and the regulation of peer-to-peer filesharing.
Last updated on February 6th.
www.PoliceStationReps.com has a secondary title of
"Find a Police Station Representative NOW". The site aims to put solicitors in touch with police station reps
around the UK. Accredited Police Station Representatives can register on the site for free and their name
will subsequently come up for appropriate searches. All the names listed have been checked against the
LSC's register of accredited police station representatives.
Last updated on February 5th.
Latest new service offered by solicitors, largely using online processes
trademarkdesignprotection is a service from
Fordelaw, Solicitors of Downpatrick, Co. Down.
The site offers a
free trademark search
which checks both the UK and OHIM (EU) Trademark Registry Databases along with
free legal advice
in relation to registration of trademarks and designs in the United Kingdom and EU.
Fordelaw is a niche firm of specialist commercial, intellectual property (IP),
information technology (IT) and media lawyers based in Northern Ireland, advising clients both in the UK and the EU.
Last updated on February 2nd.
MacRoberts, a major Scottish firm, have launched a new website
which uses several new and interesting technologies to assist their clients. The section
Interactive services describes these,
in particular:
- Use of the innovative ReadSpeaker technology (a first for a law firm) - look for the SayIT button on
the top left of each page - which when clicked will dynamically read the content of the page so assisting
blind and partially sighted users in accessing the material.
- Access to regular e-mailed e-Updates on a large number of legal areas.
- An facility called AudioNews which enables users to subscribe for personalised RSS feeds and podcasts
of the contents of the relevant e-Updates and have these
sent to iTunes or similar for listening on an iPod or other MP3 player.
- A facility called MacR2Go which allows readers to select the pages of interest on the site
(using the logo on the top right) and have these assembled, together with the Home Page, About Us and Contact
Page into a clear and logical PDF file which can be printed out for offline reference.
Last updated on February 1st.
Latest new legal blog
The Personal Injury & Mediation Service
is a blog from Personal Injury Mediator Philip Hesketh which provides information on mediation in personal injury
litigation. It is aimed primarily at claimant lawyers and defendant
insurance lawyers. It will also be of assistance to the general public
who may be interested in seeing how mediation works. Philip posts on developments in mediation
and will also be adding negotiation posts as well. The site provides links to other useful mediation
sites and to online resources in this area generally.
Last updated on January 28th.
New legal resource online
Weightmans (Birmingham, Leicester, Liverpool, London and Manchester)
have launched a new site
Disease-i which provides practical handling guidance for disease
claims and deals specifically with eight of the most prevalent occupational diseases in a medical, legal
and historical context. The diseases covered in detail are Noise induced hearing loss claims,
Hand arm vibration syndrome, Work related upper limb disorders, Asbestos related claims, Asthma,
Stress and harassment claims, Dermatitis and Silicosis.
The site is designed as an information point for claims handlers, risk and insurance managers
and health & safety professionals to use in their day to day work.
The aim is to reduce the inherent complexity of disease claims by offering practical claims handling tips and
guidance on how to approach the most common issues such as causation, foreseeability, breach of duty, limitation,
quantum and apportionment. The site will be updated on a quarterly basis and there is also an email update available
for new information.
The site is not free but is available on subscription. There is an introductory offer price
currently available, of £150. However, there is a great deal of basic information available for free.
Last updated on January 25th.
Legal IT Show 2009
takes place at the Business Design Centre in Islington on
Wednesday 4th and Thursday 5th Feb.
This is the big annual event for finding out about software and services for the legal profession.
Topics to be covered will include implementing new systems and processes in response to the current business climate and ever-changing regulatory pressures.
There are free keynote speakers and also a "Product Launch Pad" providing a platform for quick introductions
to new products and services from the exhibitors first-hand.
As well as these free events and the free exhibition, there is a conference programme costing only £99 a day and featuring
many significant speakers from major (and smaller) firms.
You can register for an exhibition pass on the site.
Opening times: 9 30am to 5pm on Wednesday 4th and 9 30am to 4 30pm on Thursday 5th.
Here are just a few of the new product launches:
Linetime will be showing the new signature edition of the Liberate suite. This will be the 4th generation of
case management software to come from Linetime and as a result contains many features built on 25 years experience
building specialist legal applications. 100% native .NET and built around a single MS SQL Server database,
the new version is targeted at the medium to large sector of the market. Key features include court bundling,
document version control and team management. The system combines the best features of case management with the
best components of matter management. This strategy will help firms cope with the new rules on compliance and
risk management regardless of the type of work being done.
SOS Legal is available to discuss recession-busting ideas for smarter and more cost-efficient working
with SOS Connect integrated practice and case management software. SOS has introduced a subscription payment model to
help firms avoid incurring upfront capital cost during these credit crunch times. SOS will be demonstrating how SOS
Connect can help firms stem time leakage. SOS has calculated that using SOS Connect, a practice with 50 fee earners
can increase chargeable time by an additional £460,000 a year.
DPS Software will be showing a new Probate Estate & Accounts module. This system automates
estate accounts production and completes all the necessary IHT forms. Simple data entry methods allow
fast loading of assets, liabilities and gifts giving the probate practitioner full effortless control over the
accounts produced. In addition, DPS’ new Personal Injury module will be shown; this has
been fully updated to include a batch of reports that can be automatically run and delivered to end users.
The updated reports include referrer reports which show matters by referrer, including acceptances,
rejections and payments. Also included in the reports are limitation date reports which show matters by
fee earner and impending limitation dates. Milestone reports showing which stage each matter has
reached are also included. Practices using DPS case and accounts have reduced their fee earner secretarial
ratios to 5-1, and less. DPS' case management system can optionally operate entirely within MS OutlookT,
and has been nominated for The Legal Technology Awards "Best Integrated Software 2009".
Eclipse Legal Systems is a leading provider of case management, practice management and workflow software.
The firm’s Proclaim software system is in use by almost 10,000 professionals dealing with a vast range of work areas.
Proclaim integrates all case management, document management, reporting, accounting, time recording, task and diary
functions, and can be web-enabled to allow clients and referrers to securely view their live case files online.
Last updated on January 22nd.
Merger of two well known Legal IT consultancies
Inpractice UK Limited is a new legal IT and business consultancy,
resulting from the merger of the established consultancies of Inpractice, run by Allan Carton, and
Professional Choice Consultancy, run by Bill Kirby. The new firm brings together 9 specialist consultants
with expertise in IT, Marketing, HR, Quality systems, risk management and compliance.
Many of the members of the new team have been working
independently at a high level with law firms across the UK and Ireland throughout the past 20 years.
As well as being available for consultancy in all these topics, the new firm has launched with 3 focused offers:
* A half day business development workshop in-house at a fee of £500
* A cost reduction investigation at £1000 with fee claw back
* A half day staff empowerment review to enable business change at a fee of £500
Another new Legal IT consultancy launched
LawPracticeConsultancy.com (lpc) is an
IT consultancy run by Jonathan Edwards, previously Managing Partner for 16 years of a major
firm of solicitors, Golds of Glasgow, now part of Irwin Mitchell.
The consultancy assists law firms and legal service providers to increase their profitability,
productivity and effectiveness. lpc's advice is based upon
long experience of top level legal management combined with a deep understanding of the delivery of legal
services and the fundamental use of systemisation and technology.
Believing that the current downturn will signify an axiomatic transformation in the delivery of legal services,
with an ever-increasing blurring between commoditisation and traditional provision, lpc specialise in advice on:-
* re-engineering legal processes;
* the creation of an effective online strategy which simultaneously serves both the organisation and their clients;
* the need to modify the structure and management of law firms to meet harsher times and a changed economy; and
* general technology implementation and design.
Last updated on January 20th.
Important new services launched on 19th January at the Law Society, in a seminar chaired by Joy Kingsley, Senior Partner of Pannone
MyLawyer is the name of a new service being set up by
Epoq. Epoq is the company
behind Rapidocs, a forms and document generation programme which was initially developed around 10 years
ago and was the basis for the (at that time) revolutionary concept and site DesktopLawyer; with a series of
questions and answers, an internet user was able to create documents relating to his/her specific requirements.
This concept is now the basis of many sites providing online legal services. Epoq however, perhaps being too
far ahead of the market at that time, switched its attention to corporate users and now provides its
document generation technology to HSBC, RBS, RSA, NatWest, Capita, DAS, Allianz, Abbey Santander and others, enabling
the customers of those organisations to produce documents without (necessarily) needing expert assistance from
a lawyer. Now, returning to the market for individuals
requiring reasonably priced online documents, Epoq is working with a number of major firms, including Nelsons, Pannone,
Hugh James, Minster Law, Brethertons and Last Cawthra Feather
to provide the technology to their clients. Epoq provides the technology to underpin the documents provided by these
firms on their own web sites.
Nelsons Online is the furthest ahead of these firms. You can see
how the system works from their web site. All the firms in the scheme will have an "online" site hosted by
epoq and using the rapidocs software and other epoq facilities, but each site will be under the control (in terms
of design as well as what documents are to be made available) by the firm concerned. The particular firms
will also provide the basic documents used in the drafting process.
One key point about mylawyer and the particular firms' sites is that the documents can be tried out before any
payment is taken, or indeed, before the potential client is required to "register" or provide other personal details;
the user can see how it all "works" and can create a document at the trial stage, but is not able to
download or print the document until payment has been made.
The design of the sites also forces the firm to carry out conflict checks, money laundering checks and provide the
required client documentation before going ahead in earnest.
There will apparently be only a total of 25 firms involved in the project - likely to be the larger firms since there are
significant costs for a firm in launching their new site, developing the documents and being part of the scheme.
The same firms will be the participating firms in the mylawyer site, and procedures
are in place to share the work round equitably as well as satisfying the clients' own requirements as to the
type of assistance needed, as well as (as far as possible) providing a local firm.
Note! This scheme has already been covered in the
Internet Newsletter for Lawyers & Law 2.0 and will be covered
again in the next issue, with more details about how it all works, and an article written by one of the
participating firms.
Last updated on January 18th.
Legallybetter is a new panel site (for solicitors) and
comparison site (for individuals). It is not strictly speaking a price comparison site but "value for money" is
one of the criteria on which clients can enter their views and general comments can be made.
Solicitors can decline to have unfavourable comments put on the site but favourable ones are (apparently)
carefully checked to see if they are genuine! Firms can purchase entries on the site at various levels,
and for particular work areas and particular local areas.
The site quotes research indicating that online research is now a key way that people look for a solicitor.
Last updated on January 13th.
39 Essex Street provides a useful database "Costs Cases Online"
consisting of those cases determined after 1st January 2005
which they believe have value as precedents. There are nearly 300 cases described, each with
a very brief summary and a fuller one. You can search in various ways and also (using JustCite)
link to a full transcript (some free and some only available on subscription).
Last updated on January 11th.
Judiciary of England and Wales is the website of the judges,
magistrates and tribunal members in England and Wales. It is not part of Government, MoJ or Parliament but prides
itself on being strictly independent. The site is designed as an information resource for members of the public
and covers the functions of the judiciary with information on who the judges are, when they site,
judgments, sentencing, practice directions and many
related topics, together with news of current issues, news items and reports.
There are interviews, surveys and even a quiz.
Last updated on January 3rd 2009.
Inksters of Glasgow, have just brought in a nice new web site. It is
very bright and light with some nice photos (scottish ones) and good clear information on all the work
areas covered. Nothing too fancy - just good information well presented. They also have two extra sites
Scotsproperty.com and
Shetlandproperty.com using the same basic design but
covering different material and more nice photos.
For older "New" items, from 2008, please see
New from 2008.
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