Honorary Secretary’s report Spring 2022

There is not a great deal to add from my report for Winter 2021. The main feature is that we now have a new Vice-Chair in Dorcas Falode who will be in line to take over as chair from Jo Connolly in the summer of 2023. She was elected unanimously by the Exec. Committee at their last meeting. At the moment she holds a brief on the committee for the welfare of practitioners. Jo Connolly has a signifi cant amount to do as Chair and the presence of a vice-chair is always a great support. We are really grateful to her for undertaking this role.

It has been good for the Executive Committee to meet “live” on the last couple of occasions and we are indebted to Lockton’s for providing us with meeting space in London in their offi ces. The Executive Committee have now moved its meetings to the afternoon to gain the benefi t of cheaper travel costs and are now enjoying a meal together in the early evening after the meeting.

We continue to be very fortunate with the administrative help given to us by Anika and Sheila in collating and dealing with emails and enquiries and all the other administrative tasks that go with running an organisation such as ours.

We are also indebted to Lockton’s for the support we get from them as our preferred insurance broker, both personally and fi nancially which provides us with independence and avoids the need for us to ask our members for a subscription, over and above that which is paid for Law Society membership at the moment as part of the practising fee. I hope in your turn you will approach Lockton’s wherever you can for your indemnity needs and as part of our agreement they undertake to give our members the best service.

Finally can I emphasise what is I’m sure being set out elsewhere in this edition to encourage you to come to this year’s conference. Everyone will be there again this year including the Chair of the Legal Services Board and representatives of the SRA and the President of the Law Society. The SIF discussions are likely to be a hot topic. Give us your support by your presence and we will continue to make things happen for your benefi t. I look forward to seeing as many of you as possible on the 24th, 25th and 26th of June. Bookings are now open.

Solicitors Indemnity Fund I’m responsible for dealing with the response to the consultation by the SRA in my capacity as being responsible for professional indemnity issues on behalf of the SPG. The feature of this report is that just before writing it we learned that the SRA had agreed to defer the closure of the Solicitors Indemnity Fund for a further year. This was as result of the 300+ submissions received which I understand is enormous amount. As you know our submission included a couple of professional investigations as to the views of the public and as to the amount of money that may or may not be needed to support the fund in the future I would hope that it will be politically impossible for those discussions to lead to a closure of the Fund, but rather that the SRA will be able to fi nd a way to change their original preferred option of closure, which I think it should be easy for them to do in the light of the numerous representations, not to mention the factual reports presented to them by the SPG.

I appreciate many people can say that this delay is a further example of kicking the can down the road but I do feel progress is being made towards an acceptable solution and that it is for the parties involved to achieve this by a more open dialogue rather than the megaphone diplomacy which preceded the SRA consultation paper.

We will continue to be involved in that discussion and I am a member of the SRA virtual reference group which is a stakeholders consultation group. Our own Executive Committee also has a liaison group which meets regularly with the SRA and will also be able to feed into issues on the subject as well as other issues.

We also have close links with the Law Society and as you know, we are very proud to be able to say that the actual President of the Law Society from October for the following year will be our executive committee member and ex-Chair, Lubna Shuja.

Accordingly I hope we will be well placed to fi nding a mechanism for the continuance of the Fund with the support of the reports that we have obtained, one of which indicated that there should not need to be much of a fi nancial contribution required from the members of the profession.

Clive Sutton, Honorary Secretary.

Elizabeth J. Soilleux

MA, MB, BChir, PhD, FRCPath, PGDipMedEd CONSULTANT PATHOLOGIST

Experienced Cambridge and Oxford-trained consultant pathologist with particular interests in haematopathology (lymphomas, leukaemias), cardiovascular pathology & autopsy pathology.

Expert Witness Certificate (Civil Law), Bond Solon / Cardiff University

• Biopsy Pathology (esp Lymphoma & Leukaemia) • Autopsy Pathology (esp Cardiovascular Pathology) • Professional Conduct (GMC work undertaken)

Department of Pathology, Cambridge University / Addenbrookes Hospital, Cambridge Tel: 07798 643879 Email: lizsoilleux@gmail.com www.expertwitnesspathologist.co.uk

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