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Publication of legal education review faces yet another delay

18 February 2013 | By Becky Waller-Davies

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The most important review of legal education for decades has been held up for the second time this year, following delays in December and January.

The legal education and training review (LETR) was originally intended for publication in December 2012, according to the Bar Standards Board (BSB). The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) then set a date of 16 January 2013 but announced five days beforehand that the team behind the review needed more time “finalising” the report.

Today, the LETR team stated: “Good progress is being made by the research team in their work to ensure that the range and depth of the data collected through extensive engagement with stakeholders is fully reflected in their final report.

“The report is not now expected to be submitted to the three sponsoring regulators - SRA, BSB, and IPS [Ilex Professional Standards] - before May 2013, following which it will be published. The sponsoring regulators support the research team’s view that it’s important to ensure that the data is fully reflected in the report, even though that means a delay in its finalisation.”

A spokesperson for the SRA, which is coordinating communications for the review, said that it would not comment on a possible publication date.

Keele University law professor Fiona Cownie, who is a member of the LETR steering panel, told Lawyer2B she had “absolutely no idea” when the review would be published. She added: “I don’t know anybody who knows. I imagine the only people who know are the review team themselves.”

The first-ever qualifying law degree was put on hold by the SRA as it awaited the outcome of the review (8 January 2013).

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Readers' comments (5)

  • Anonymous | 18-Feb-2013 4:37 pm

    get your act together

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  • Anonymous | 18-Feb-2013 4:40 pm

    How can the LETR team say 'good progress' has been made when it blatantly has not. It will be almost six months late by the time it is published, if at all. Meanwhile, more and more people are signing up to a legal qualification that may well be rendered useless in coming months as the SRA and LSB decide to tear up the rule book.

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  • Anonymous | 19-Feb-2013 10:24 am

    It does appear there are merely stalling to allow hundreds more to pay the huge SRA and/or Bar membership fees before turning around and saying, yeah, that course you just forked out £5,000 - £12,5000 on, it's worthless...

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  • Beth | 19-Feb-2013 1:03 pm

    I have worked on publications in medium size organisations. If a report is being published, it will be signed off at multiple levels in a process that takes weeks. It can take months if the document is going to be put in a pretty format rather than just published as a Word document. If the problem is genuinely data analysis, there is no way that anyone would have thought on 10 January that a 16 January publication date was reasonable. The delay would have been known well in advance of this.

    My best guess is that someone doesn't like the report's conclusions and has asked the team working on it to go back to the drawing board.

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  • Anonymous | 20-Feb-2013 11:45 pm

    Real issue is why there was any need for LETR in first place. A complete waste of money that BSB and SRA let themselves be bullied into by the arrogant overlords from LSB.

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