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The Legal Services Commission (“LSC”) should play a “central role” in setting the standards for assuring the quality of legal services, according to the Chief Executive of the LSC.
Speaking at the Westminster Legal Policy Forum Keynote Seminar on 9 February, Carolyn Regan said that although the responsibility for assuring the quality of legal services should “sit with the regulators ... I am equally clear that the LSC, as a majority funder of legal aid services, has a central role in setting the standards by which we commission these standards. That is why we are following up the pilot work already carried out by the Centre for Professional Legal Studies at Cardiff University Law School with a discussion paper about quality assurance for advocates to be launched next week.”
Although it was “certainly for the regulators to take the lead on this ... our involvement should continue until we are confident that the necessary standards are in place to assure the quality of services on which clients depend,” she added. Speaking also about the warnings of “a looming crisis in the legal professions” she said: “We are told, for example, that changes which would open up the legal services market to other providers to deliver more flexible services for clients at an improved cost for the taxpayer, threaten the future of the Bar. At the same time, we know that the Bar’s vocation course was oversubscribed last year.”
Although it was “certainly for the regulators to take the lead on this ... our involvement should continue until we are confident that the necessary standards are in place to assure the quality of services on which clients depend,” she added. Speaking also about the warnings of “a looming crisis in the legal professions” she said: “We are told, for example, that changes which would open up the legal services market to other providers to deliver more flexible services for clients at an improved cost for the taxpayer, threaten the future of the Bar. At the same time, we know that the Bar’s vocation course was oversubscribed last year.”
The Legal Services Commission (“LSC”) should play a “central role” in setting the standards for assuring the quality of legal services, according to the Chief Executive of the LSC.
Speaking at the Westminster Legal Policy Forum Keynote Seminar on 9 February, Carolyn Regan said that although the responsibility for assuring the quality of legal services should “sit with the regulators ... I am equally clear that the LSC, as a majority funder of legal aid services, has a central role in setting the standards by which we commission these standards. That is why we are following up the pilot work already carried out by the Centre for Professional Legal Studies at Cardiff University Law School with a discussion paper about quality assurance for advocates to be launched next week.”
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