Matilda Battersby is a freelance journalist and editor, and a senior reporter at the Today’s Media titles. She worked at The Independent newspaper for many years, but has also worked at The Times, Evening Standard, Telegraph and I newspapers since going freelance in 2015. Her specialisms are property and books, having worked extensively for various trade property magazines and The Bookseller magazine. She is based in East London.
August sales volumes were largely static with a majority of estate agents suggesting asking prices are not being met, according to the latest Propertymark report. There were an average of 69 new prospective buyers registering
The new president of the Law Society of England and Wales has vowed to “champion a criminal justice system that is fit for the future”. Brett Dixon became the 182nd president, replacing outgoing president Mark
The Law Society Property Conference in Chancery Lane, London, brought together leading industry voices to discuss issues including Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digitalisation, updates to the National Conveyancing Protocol and the government’s planned home buying
A consultation on proposed updates to the National Conveyancing Protocol has been announced at the annual Law Society Property Conference hosted at Chancery Lane. The Conveyancing Protocol is the Law Society of England and Wales’
The Justice Committee has welcomed the government’s decision to roll back on jury reforms, but has issued new warnings over the burden being placed on magistrates’ courts, saying planned recruitment of magistrates is “unrealistic”. Last
The government has announced plans to extend Awaab’s law to private rentals, potentially more than doubling the number of households legally entitled to fast damp and mould repairs. A consultation launched this week on how
The government has mostly scaled back its plans to scrap juries for some criminal trials, with the Lord Chancellor responding to the “strength of feeling” on the issue. In December 2025 the then-deputy prime minister
The chair of the Legal Services Board (LSB), Monisha Shah, has warned regulators to “identify emerging risks before they become system challenges” and protect consumers while supporting innovation. In her opening remarks at the International
The Law Society of England and Wales has welcomed the government’s new anti-money laundering and recovery strategy, but has warned about the potential for “increased burden” and duplication of work for solicitors and firms. The
There were more than 100,000 extra mortgage sales agreed in 2025 compared with a year earlier, but the figures are still a more than a third lower than 20 years ago, new research reveals. There
House builder Vistry has called for a new ‘Choice-led Shared Ownership’ model to contribute up to 30,000 homes a year towards the government’s 1.5 million homes target. Vistry is among a coalition of 35 housing
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has fined a solicitor more than £20,000 for “a reckless disregard to the risk of harm and his regulatory obligations” over five years. Bryn Roberts, a sole practitioner at Evan
The incoming Law Society president has called for greater openness around disability in the legal sector. Brett Dixon, who will take up the post from October 2026, said improving disability inclusion is one of the
The majority of local government planning departments in England and Wales are understaffed, according to new research from the Home Builders Federation (HBF). Nine out of 10 local authority planning departments are operating below full
The Law Society of England and Wales has warned that the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) complaints handling proposals could “increase administrative burden without delivering clear benefits for consumers”. The SRA recently consulted for a second
A property with damp or structural issues would prevent more than a third of buyers making an offer, new research from LRG reveals. The survey of more than 700 buyers and sellers found that damp
New research shows that 94% of lawyers use Artificial Intelligence (AI) for legal work, with 74% using it at least once a week and 34% using it every day. One in 10 (10%) of the
The Law Society has raised “serious concerns” over proposed changes to fees for the Legal Ombudsman. The 12 week consultation period on The Office for Legal Complaints’s (OLC) proposed changes to the Legal Ombudsman’s (LeO)
Home building generates more than £60 billion of social and economic value for local communities across England and Wales, new research from the Home Builders Federation (HBF) suggests. New homes built in England and Wales
The number of council tenants buying their homes off the local authority via the Right to Buy scheme went up 90% this financial year compared with a year earlier. Local authorities reported 14,275 eligible sales
A former director of Axiom Ince has been struck off and ordered to pay £5,000 in costs for amending an invoice to give “the misleading impression” of a discount. Toby Richard Matthews admitted to dishonestly
An overwhelming majority of small and medium enterprise (SME) house builders think the Building Safety Levy will make more development sites unviable, new research from the Home Builders Federation (HBF) reveals. As the home building
A consultation has been launched on proposed changes to the composition of the Residential Property Chamber of First-tier Tribunals to make them more flexible. The proposals are designed to help the system meet the anticipated
The time it takes to sell a UK home remains unchanged on average year-on-year but the regional picture is quite different, according to new analysis from Zoopla. The national average time to sell of 42
The government has announced the loosening of planning policy to try and encourage the building of thousands of new homes around England’s train, tram and underground stations, including on greenbelt land. Secretary of state for
Nearly a quarter of the population of England and Wales lives in an area classed as a ‘legal aid desert’, new research reveals. Analysis of local authority data by LexisNexis suggests that 14.49 million people,
Remortgage activity has returned to normal following the spike seen in March, according to the latest Q2 2026 statistics from conveybuddy. The latest quarterly figures show purchase/sale transactions increased as a proportion of overall instructions
Former defence secretary John Healey has been announced as the new Chancellor of the Exchequer in Andy Burnham’s government, replacing Rachel Reeves. His first move has been to remove VAT from energy bills. “For too
Mortgage demand softened in the second quarter of this year as affordability pressures were exacerbated by rising borrowing costs, the latest research suggests. The Stonebridge network’s quarterly Mortgage Market Index shows the average rate rose
New research recommends introducing Flood Performance Certificates (FPCs) for all new-build properties. FPCs are similar in concept to Energy Performance Certificates, and are designed to provide a formal assessment of a property’s resilience to flooding.
Only one in 10 first time buyers in Northern England pay stamp duty compared to five out of 10 in the South East and nearly eight in 10 in London, new analysis from Zoopla reveals.
Ministry of Justice (MoJ) data reveals the number of Black judges has remained “disappointingly stagnant”. The diversity of the judiciary statistics for 2026 show Black judges make up only 1.6% of the judiciary, up slightly