The latest Legal Week/EJ Legal Big Question survey shows most business lawyers think the Law Society is either ‘poor’ or ‘terrible’ at representing commercial firms, with just 6% saying the body does a ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ job.
Forty-three percent of respondents said
Simmons & Simmons financial litigation head Jonathan Kelly said: “There is very little visibility of the Law Society among City practices. The only sentiment people have is overwhelming agnosticism. The principle issue large City practices are concerned with is conflicts.”
He added: “There is definitely a role for a strong association that represents the profession on a more philosophical level, for example, when speaking to the Government about human rights issues. In terms of the business and practical side of the profession, there is very little that the society can tell big firms.”
However, many believe the Law Society’s standing with major firms has improved during the last two years, during which it has split its representative and regulatory arms and attempted to market itself to City firms.
Almost half (47%) of City partners thought the Law Society’s standing with commercial firms had improved over the last two years, with 4% saying it had ‘greatly’ improved. A further 37% thought that the association’s standing remained unchanged, with the remaining 15% saying that it had worsened.
The modernisation of the society as a whole in preparation for the Legal Services Bill has generally been well received by the City. Forty percent said its adaptation was adequate and 22% said it is repositioning itself either ‘well’ or ‘very well’. Nevertheless, 36% of the profession thought it was coping poorly with the changes and 2% thought its approach was misconceived.
The majority of respondents (58%) thought the paring off of the Solicitors’ Regulatory Authority had had no effect on the Law Society, while 12% thought the effect had actually been negative. Fifteen percent thought the change had been positive, and an equal 15% said it had been very positive.
Law Society president Fiona Woolf responded: “The City is far more interested in the promoting and protecting side of the profession than the services and regulation side. Although this year there have been a number of big wins for the City, including a breakthrough on access to
She added: “I take a degree of encouragement from the results, particularly that they think we are coping with the changes under the Legal Services Bill; however, we still need to demonstrate that we are looking after the whole profession.”
Travers Smith private equity partner Paul Dolman commented: “The Law Society can often be one step behind what City practitioners are actually doing in practice. The good news is that the big firms are generally good at self-policing with their own finance, ethics and conflicts departments; therefore the split of the body has largely gone unnoticed.”
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