Legal Services Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 108ZB: 108ZB: Clause 71 , page 40, line 38, at end insert— ““provided that a body is not a ““licensable body”” if the only managers who are non-authorised persons are individuals who do not provide any services to consumers”” The noble Lord said: This amendment, which has been inspired by the City of London Law Society, would ensure that a law firm will not become an ABS solely because it wishes to appoint as a manager—that is to say, a partner member—a non-lawyer professional. Examples of individuals whom it might want to appoint are a head of finance, a head of IT or a head of similar skills. The amendment will apply only if these appointees exclusively provide internal services to their firms and do not provide any services to clients of the firm. We agree that it is important to protect consumers through regulation of firms with outside investment or those which are controlled by non-lawyers. However, the additional burden of the ABS regime should not apply wholesale to any firm that may in future appoint a non-lawyer manager as head of one of the activities to which I have referred the Committee and who does not supply any external services. In these situations alone, the protection to the consumer afforded by the ABS regime will be entirely superfluous; and the firms will not be faced with the burden of unnecessary bureaucracy. I beg to move.