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13 December 2024 / Dominic Regan
Issue: 8098 / Categories: Opinion , Profession
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The insider: 13 December 2024

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Dominic Regan presents A Christmas Carol: enter, the ghosts of Christmas past (the Solicitors Act 1974), present (the new intermediate track), & future (PACCAR legislation)

Well, that didn’t last long. On Friday 29 November, I went along to the 13th National Forum of the Civil Justice Council (CJC) in London. The courts minister, Heidi Alexander, gave a detailed speech setting out her objectives for the next four years. An hour later, she was moved to Transport.

On the positive side, she swooned over the Master of the Rolls, whom she had met a fortnight earlier. She admitted to having ordered her private secretary to ‘bring me more Sir Geoffreys’, such was her admiration for him. Readers of this column will know that I too hold him in the highest regard, along with Sir Colin Birss, deputy head of civil justice, and Dame Sue Carr. Our Lady Chief Justice is revered by judges at every level.

Colin Passmore, whose new bible on privilege has just been published, was giddy about her when

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

WSP Solicitors—David Ashcroft & Jessica O’Shea

WSP Solicitors—David Ashcroft & Jessica O’Shea

Commercial property and child law teams expand with senior hires

Duxton Hill Chambers—Lucas Bastin KC & Joshua Hiew

Duxton Hill Chambers—Lucas Bastin KC & Joshua Hiew

Set expands London and Singapore offering with senior international disputes hires

Gilson Gray—Gregor Duthie & Stephen Forsyth

Gilson Gray—Gregor Duthie & Stephen Forsyth

Firm strengthens real estate and litigation teams with partner promotions

NEWS
Behind the profession’s polished exterior, lawyers are ‘internally drained rather than physically tired’, according to a stark assessment of burnout in legal practice
Five years after the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 came into force, concerns remain that the family courts continue to minimise allegations of abuse in child contact disputes
Uber has built a formidable strategy for insulating itself from liability for drivers’ conduct, but the legal terrain differs sharply between the US and England and Wales
The Civil Justice Council’s review of Part III of the Solicitors Act 1974 could mark the end of what one commentator calls an ‘outdated’ and overly technical regime governing solicitor-client fee disputes
The House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Act 2026 marks a constitutional watershed by severing the centuries-old link between hereditary titles and automatic membership of the upper chamber
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