CEO’s closing remarks

We are concerned that the amendments stages may repeat what we saw with the Legal Profession and Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007, where a significant volume of late amendments added complexity, confusion and cost to how the system works in practice. We are working hard with officials, the committee and other stakeholders to avoid this.

Likewise, we are keen to implement the changes swiftly to deliver benefits for the public and profession, avoiding a repeat of the Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2010 which remains unimplemented after 14 years.

There are big opportunities, and a chance to rethink all our approaches, work collaboratively with stakeholders, and engage the public and profession in designing new systems. That includes renewed work to ensure equality, consumer focus, and accessibility for the often vulnerable users we serve.

We hope the Bill will allow progress and new ways to tackle the longstanding and systemic issue of large numbers of solicitors failing to respond to the SLCC, in breach of the law and their regulatory responsibilities. It remains of deep concern that regulated professionals – holders of the public office of Officer of the Court – fail to respect the rule of law. If reform is delayed, we will need to invest in other ways to further our work in this area.

This also illustrates the challenge for the SLCC, which is operating under a temporary one-year continuation of its strategy. In managing our work prudently and efficiently, do we trust reform implementation will be swift and allow us to tackle current challenges through new powers? Or could a delay in the Bill or its implementation mean we should pursue and invest in stop-gap measures based on the current set-up?

We will have to carefully track implementation planning by government to assess this on an ongoing basis. When we consult on our budget in December the Bill will not yet have concluded its passage and it is likely we must, for the second year running, plan for both scenarios and react as the year evolves.

The high current caseload from the failure of a single firm will continue to be a feature this year, despite the incoming numbers now reducing, and our operational focus will be on maintaining core performance and low complaint journey times.

We’ve also exciting projects ahead – an independent governance review to make sure we have the highest standards of organisational oversight, work to review equalities issues for the profession and public and how that must be reflected in our services, work on data maturity and adding value to our work through data and insight, and starting the process to re-tender some elements of our work as part of our ongoing commitment to best value. There is a lot planned, and we look forward to reporting on outcomes next year.