Following the accession of Andy Burnham to Labour leader, the Law Society of England and Wales has called on the new prime minister to work with the legal sector to support growth across the country.
Law Society president Mark Evans said Burnham should recognise the role of solicitors outside of London and empower communities by removing “regulatory barriers that hold back innovation and regional development”.
The government must invest in the skills needed to build legal careers and enable the responsible adoption of AI to drive growth, he added.
The new government has a “golden opportunity” to rebuild public confidence in the courts system, Evans said, calling on the government to “improve investment in legal aid to tackle record court backlogs and ensure people can access timely justice”.
He added: “Early legal advice and a properly funded justice system will help to lower court backlogs and ensure cases can be resolved efficiently.”
Following the Justice Committee report published last week, the Law Society said it wants to see investment in legal aid, with the implementation of the agreed uplift in the means test a “vital next step” as part of efforts to meet manifesto commitments to halve violence against women and girls.
The Burnham government should also focus on improving public bodies’ initial decisions to show “true commitment to our communities and ensures everyone can access justice”, Evans said, instead of restricting rights to appeal.
In a message circulated in the wake of his appointment, Burnham said that “people and places in every nation and region of our country have been overlooked by Westminster”.
He added: “Our generation of politicians – myself included – have failed to challenge a political culture and an economic model that simply doesn’t work for most people.
“So this is the moment we build something different. A new kind of politics, more focused on problem-solving than point-scoring. A rewired Britain that takes power away from Westminster and Whitehall, and puts it back in the hands of the people who know how to use it best.”
Property commentators have called on the new government to continue the work to on reforming the home buying and selling process.
Andrew Lloyd, managing director of property data firm Search Acumen, said a land levy will require cross-party support for at least the next decade, well beyond Burnham’s tenure, to keep reform moving through to completion.
“A new land tax to replace council tax and stamp duty in the residential markets would be a watershed moment for housing,” Lloyd said.
“For many years governments have viewed the prospect of valuing millions of properties fairly as a challenge too great, no doubt in part because it risks opening the door to disputes, appeals, and administrative costs that would quickly combine to swallow a significant portion of any revenue raised.
“The challenge in successfully valuing properties is precisely why council tax has not been re-evaluated since 1991, when Margaret Thatcher was in office and Bryan Adams was topping the charts. But the very fact that this has not been done for 35 years only underlines the importance of reform to ensure our taxes better reflect today’s housing market and economy.”
He added: “There is broad agreement that the UK needs a more modern property tax system which should help. But the industry needs immediate clarity on the government’s direction of travel because few things undermine confidence faster than uncertainty, and we have recent evidence of how tax proposals floated before a budget can unsettle markets. Confidence drives investment, investment drives growth, and growth is ultimately what funds public services.”
2 responses
The new PM Abandoning over the weekend the centralised digital ID scheme, aligns with the core principles of many front line conveyancers.
It underscores the idea that technology should support, rather than dictate or replace, professional legal judgment and human accountability.
This shift offers the government a vital opportunity to look beyond superficial tech fixes on offer from law tech sellers, instead collaborating with frontline practitioners, to address the actual behavioural and structural inefficiencies causing delays in homebuying.
Principle not greed should prevail.
I fully agree with Stephen Larcombe, but I remain sceptical about all politicians, including this new PM – because they give off the distinct impression by their decisions and by ignoring what they are told by us, the people, that they all work towards furthering the goals of a hidden agenda which is rarely, if ever, anything to do with the actual people they are supposed to represent.
The new PM is ” abolishing” digital ID – but the system is already embedded and here to stay, so pure gaslighting really – – Companies House digital requirements, for example.
We can all live in hope, but I fear that the only way to take back control from those that do not have our interests in mind, is some form of “revolutionary” change, which will hopefully take place organically as more and more people see through the charade which many us already do ( when their lives are more adversely affected day by day).