Closed Consultation

Draft SRA Practising Regulations [2009]

20 June 2008

The deadline for submission of responses to consultation paper 9 on the Legal Services Act was 9 June 2008. Consultation outputs—including reports, recommendations and proposed regulations—were submitted to the SRA Board for consideration in mid-June 2008:

• Changes to rules and regulations to enable LDPs and implement other changes made by the Legal Services Act – Overview paper
  • Annex 1 – Design principles 
  • Annex 2 – Equality impact assessment
   

• Legal Services Act 2007 – Draft SRA Practising Regulations [2009] – Report of the Firm Based Regulation Group
  • Supplemental paper 1 – Further responses
  • Annex 1 – Draft SRA Practising Regulations [2009] 
  • Supplemental paper 2 – Annex 1A (replaces Annex 1)
   

The information that appears below is for reference purposes only.

This consultation invites you to comment on the draft SRA Practising Regulations, which are annexed to the paper and which we hope to introduce in July 2009. The SRA Practising Regulations have been drafted to implement a number of changes made by the Legal Services Act (the Act). They deal with practising certificates for solicitors and registration of European and foreign lawyers, authorisation of solicitors and European lawyers who are sole practitioners, and associated processes.

Our existing regulations have to be amended

• to reflect new SRA powers to make rules and regulations about practising certificates and registration, often in place of prescriptive statutory provisions which the Act repeals, and
• to introduce a new regime for the authorisation of solicitors and European lawyers who are sole practitioners, as required under the Act.

The intention is that sole practitioners will be regulated by the SRA in broadly the same way as recognised bodies, but the authorisation process for sole practitioners will be part of the practising certificate or registration process and not part of the "recognised body" recognition process.

In November 2007, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) published a policy paper which contains much of the background to our work in implementing the changes the Act will bring about. That policy paper—Legal Services Act: New forms of practice and regulation—outlines our initial thoughts on implementing key provisions in the Act which change the SRA's regulatory powers and obligations to facilitate firm-based regulation and legal disciplinary practices (LDPs). The policy paper also sets out our "design principles", which include:

• developing streamlined, simple and clear rules, regulations; processes and procedures;
• not imposing restrictions over and above those provided for in the Act unless they are necessary in the consumer and public interest;
• being as open as possible in planning for changes and consulting with all interested parties;
• introducing change in an evolutionary way and so as to minimise or offset regulatory burdens; including, if appropriate, the use of passporting procedures for new regulatory requirements.

Many of the processes and requirements in the draft are already in place, either in the current legislation or in the current regulations. We have no wish to disrupt those we regulate unnecessarily and we have tried to build on these existing processes and requirements, introducing new processes or requirements only to the extent necessary to implement the Act or where we have identified a need, in the public interest, to do so.

Although a legislative framework for firm-based regulation will modernise and improve the regulatory environment for solicitors it will not (and cannot) replace the need for the individual authorisation schemes under which the SRA enrols solicitors and issue practising certificates, and registers European lawyers. Nor does it replace the scheme for registering foreign lawyers for the purpose of joint practice in England and Wales with solicitors. The Act does, however, require us to make considerable changes to these individual processes.

The draft SRA Practising Regulations bring together the provisions of three sets of regulations:

•  the Practising Certificate Regulations 1995,
• the European Lawyers Registration Regulations 2000, and
• the Foreign Lawyers Registration Regulations 1995.

The draft Regulations are intended not only to implement the Act but to reflect our "design principles," by bringing together, lining up and simplifying the provisions of these three current sets of regulations. They are drafted to

• introduce an authorisation regime for solicitors and registered European lawyers (RELs) as "recognised sole practitioners",
• amend and introduce new provisions about applications and appeals relating to individual practising certificates and registration, and also the authorisation of recognised sole practitioners,
• "passport" sole practitioners into the new authorisation regime (rather than requiring them all to make initial applications at a particular time) provided they are already legitimately practising as sole practitioners under current rules,
• require all "passported" sole practitioners to renew authorisation in October 2009, supplying on renewal much the same information as a partnership which is a recognised body would be required to provide,
• introduce new provisions required or permitted by the new legislation, governing the discretion to refuse a practising certificate or registration and to impose conditions on a practising certificate or registration,
• provide for the duration, expiry and revocation of practising certificates, registrations and authorisations and for the information to be kept on the relevant registers, shown on a practising certificate or certificate of registration, and made available to the public.

The consultation is aimed at all those interested in the provision and regulation of legal services, including consumers.

The SRA Practising Regulations are likely to affect anyone wishing to practise as a solicitor, REL or registered foreign lawyer (RFL), and any solicitor and REL practising or intending to practise in England and Wales as a sole practitioner.

Consumer bodies and those who are (or hope to become) consumers of legal services are more likely to be interested in the provisions about the keeping of the registers, and what information which will be available to the public about the standing and authorisation of individual solicitors, RELs and RFLs.

During early 2008 we published a number of consultation papers on specific aspects of the project. Most of them relate to the introduction of firm-based regulation for partnerships and to the introduction of LDPs but Legal Services Act: Consultation paper 2 on changes to the "framework of practice" rules in the Solicitors' Code of Conduct 2007 also deals with changes to rules on in-house practice, overseas practice and sole practice and therefore links most closely with the individual processes dealt with here.

Downloadable document(s)

• Legal Services Act: Consultation paper 9 (PDF 181K)