Practice Management

Barristers are eyeing up the opportunities presented by the new legal business structures, with 43 per cent interested in setting up shop with solicitors. 

Direct access across the board is inevitable for the Bar, according to the Chairman of the Bar Council. 

The Bar Standards Board is to conduct a YouGov survey among barristers, clerks and practice managers on their opinions and expectations regarding the new business structures permitted under the Legal Services Act 2007.  The survey will be emailed by YouGov, the Institute of Barristers’ Clerks and the Legal Practice Managers Association.

Names: Mark Ellison QC and Martin Secrett
Positions: Criminal/Fraud Silk and Senior Clerk
Chambers: QEB Hollis Whiteman 

The BSB currently has an open consultation on authorisation to practise arrangements, which has the deadline of 1 June 2010 for responses.  

There is a real possibility that new areas of work can now flow directly into the Bar, believes Nick Green QC 

The Legal Services Board approves Bar Standards Board applications designed to relax provisions in Code of Conduct for barristers’ working practices 

The Legal Services Act has dramatically reformed the regulatory landscape for barristers, allowing practise in new business structures
alongside other barristers, legal professionals and nonlawyers. 

Amid reports that the Revenue will soon start a concerted campaign targeting the tax affairs of self-employed barristers, Ashley Hayman considers what the Revenue will be looking for.  

Giving evidence to the Public Accounts Committee in 2008, Dave Hartnett, Acting Chairman of Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs  (“the Revenue”), reported that there had been 57 barristers who were in the “hidden economy” and not paying any tax at all. Maybe such cases were deliberate; maybe they were due to astonishing oversight. But if you happen to be in the hidden economy you need to take urgent advice about putting your affairs in order before the Revenue launch a tax enquiry into you. Even the vast majority who do submit accounts and tax returns to the Revenue are not immune from challenge. The Revenue have recently shown a close interest in the tax affairs of a number of respectable professionals (including, for example, doctors and vets), and there is a specialist team at the Euston Tower tax office charged with enquiring into the affairs of barristers. 

THE Chairman of the Bar, Nicholas Green QC, has called for the Bar to continue to modernise as it enters a new era of legal services provision. Speaking at a meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Legal and Constitutional Affairs in the House of Lords, Nick Green QC will set out the challenges facing the Bar following the implementation of the Legal Services Act and outlined how the Bar is responding. The meeting, entitled The Legal Services Act: Opportunities for Consumers and Professionals, was chaired by Lord Brennan QC. David Edmonds, the Chairman of the Legal Services Board, and Bob Heslett, the President of the Law Society, addressed the group alongside Nicholas Green QC. 

Speaking ahead of the meeting, Chairman of the Bar, Nicholas Green QC said: 

‘The Bar Standards Board took a historic decision in November 2009 to change the Bar’s practice rules. If these changes are approved by the Legal Services Board, barristers could take advantage of new structures to deliver specialist advisory and advocacy services and to work in partnership with other providers of legal services. The Bar is currently facing huge regulatory as well as market
challenges. In order to continue to provide services which clients and consumers continue to need, the Bar needs to adapt its business model and consider new ways of working. I am confident we can do this. Indeed, it is clear to me that many Chambers are already well advanced in their plans for change. The Bar Council has been running a series of nationwide road shows about the future of the profession in the new regulatory environment. Taking account of the feedback we have received from practitioners up and down the country, we expect shortly to provide guidance on options for change for Chambers to consider and adapt as they see fit to suit their own needs and circumstances.The feedback we have receiving from the profession has been enormously positive. It is clear that many barristers, particularly those with publicly funded practices which are under considerable financial pressure from planned cuts in legal aid, are eager to develop their business models. Many chambers are developing innovative new models of practice.’