Turn of the year

With the Society's AGM again coinciding with the change of President, there has been a theme this past month of reviewing where the Society, and the profession, is now and what might lie on the road ahead.

It has, as the AGM report in the June Journal indicates, been a significant year, with the office move the most visible sign of the Society's progress but the Leading Legal Excellence strategy more significant in terms of its direction of travel.

Each of these, however, will serve mainly as a catalyst for increasingly rapid change, and in 12 months' time we will likely be looking back at another breathless year.

For one thing, the Society is very hopeful of being able to secure a much needed overhaul of the Solicitors and Legal Profession Acts, bringing the reforms needed for it to carry through its own agenda for change as well as smoothing the path for the regulation of new providers of legal services.

Then we have a renewed focus on access to justice, and while it would be naive to expect early gains on the legal aid front, the current exercise to build a picture of legal aid firms' profitability (or lack of) shows a continued intent to try and win them a better deal. Despite the new Government's lack of an overall majority, it is not going to be very much easier to muster enough parliamentary support, but we will at least see more political trading than before the election, and the success in challenging the proposed Sheriff Appeal Court regulations offers some cause for hope if a good case can be made.

These and the other “critical projects” the Society's board has in hand (accreditation rules; membership growth; commercial income and business development) make it likely that information, and requests for member input and views, will be coming out at regular intervals. The Journal will do as much as possible to keep members up to speed, through the magazine and via the online news – readers should stay balert if they wish to have their say in good time.

Speaking of change, many solicitors were understandably surprised at the news that Marsh will no longer be in charge of the Master Policy as from next January, having lost out in the latest retender. Concerns have been aired, via the Journal and at the AGM, which the Society has attempted to answer – click here for more. At the end of the day it has to take a judgment on the best outcome for members. As we all know, such procedures are part of modern life – and yes, the Journal comes under the same regular scrutiny.