The Solicitors Regulation Authority cut a deal yesterday with its external implementation group (EIG) to launch the review, in a move designed to improve transparency.

Total confidence

The investigation -- which will be conducted by leading legal academic Professor Gus John from London University -- will examine 160 files, half having been prepared for Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal prosecutions in which the SDT published its findings or judgment, and 80 files that were dealt with by internal adjudication. Half the files will relate to ethnic minority lawyers and half to white respondents.
The four-year-old EIG was created to work with the SRA to address possible issues of disproportionality relating to ethnic minority solicitors. Its chairman, Lord Herman Ouseley, commented on yesterday’s development: ‘This review is timely as there are claims by some black and minority ethnic solicitors that they are not being treated fairly when taken through the regulatory processes. The profession needs to have total confidence that the regulatory processes are not in any way discriminatory.’

Progress

SRA chief executive Antony Townsend said: ‘I am pleased that we have agreed the terms of reference and can proceed with the review, working constructively with EIG and the wider profession. We look forward to the findings so that we can assess what further work may need to be done, to ensure that the SRA carries out its regulatory responsibilities fairly and consistently.
‘We have made a lot of progress in the last four years in addressing disproportionality and promoting equality, but [the] review will help us to identify whether there is still work to be done and how we should take this forward.’