Abdication of duty by Law Society of Scotland
“A serious abdication of its duty to the profession” is how Margaret Taylor describes the Law Society of Scotland’s approach to Alternative Business Structures (ABS) in a recent article for The Lawyer.
The Law Society of Scotland announced earlier this month that they are doing nothing further on ABS in Scotland for another two years. That is despite the Regulation of Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2025 reducing the requirement for lawyer ownership in an ABS from 51% to 0%. It is also following an already 15-year delay in the Law Society of Scotland implementing ABS in Scotland, under and in terms of the Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2010.
Margaret Taylor refers to the Law Society of Scotland as “the spanner in the works”. She considers that the Society “failed to pull its regulatory finger out” in 2010. Margaret also states that, “by failing to give Scottish firms the option of riding the private equity wave, the law society is now putting its members at a serious disadvantage.”
A serious abdication of duty by the Law Society, indeed.
You can read the full article here: Scotland’s Law Society is shackling its law firms [NB paywall]
Image credit: BBC – Edward VIII Abdication speech 11 December 1936
Reactions on Abdication of duty by Law Society of Scotland
On LinkedIn the following comments have been made:-
Mitch Kowalski (General Counsel/Senior Real Estate Counsel | Commercial • Development • Governance (ICD.D) • Risk • Airport):
Hear, hear!
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Mark Dunkley (Retired Solicitor):
Ahhh yes indeed and precisely what has Professor Richard Susskind KC (Hon) got to say about this utter shambles he so keenly and eagerly brought about, arguing that the Legal Profession had no choice but to adopt these quite barmy changes or face huge bankruptcies and enormous contraction in its number? Precisely the opposite has happened since 2010, of course!!
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