Legal Services Bill [HL]

I am extremely grateful to be able to intervene, because in a sense I am a latecomer to this debate—although I must say that noble Lords all look very nice on the monitor. I want to throw in one aspect that ties in with what the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, was saying. We should not be frightened of competition. I do not think that the providers of legal services have ever had need to be frightened of competition. We have seen an extraordinary amount of change in the past 20 years. It is not at all territorial—I can think of lawyers going from respected firms in London to live in Scotland, who continue to give highly specialised employment law advice. I know that schools with which I am associated take advice on employment issues from people who are not lawyers and that accountants and lawyers already work together. My point is that we should not be frightened of competition. Whatever we do to be cautious and protect from bad developments, we must be careful not to over-regulate. What we expect from lawyers, wherever they are and whoever they are associated with in partnership, is that they are properly trained, that they keep up to date and that they maintain the high professional standards that we expect from all parts of the profession. If we achieve that, we will have gone a long way.