The new president of Birmingham Law Society is aiming to help boost beleaguered high street law firms during his year in office but also wants to bring a sense of fun to a profession he believes is sometimes seen as “dour”.
“I want it to be a year of fun,” said Martin Allsopp, who added he was proud to lead an organisation that has more than 4,000 members and is the largest local law society by some considerable distance in England.
Acknowledging it was “a big job” – the stalwart of the Midlands law scene who runs his own practice – Martin Allsopp & Co Solicitors - in Solihull – added: “Lawyers can be very dour so I am going to liven it up for a year.
READ MORE: {}
“I want to bring some fun back into the profession, it is perceived as being very dour. If I can make people smile in the next 12 months I will have done my job.
“It is a hard job and when you get out at 5.30pm you want a bit of fun. I certainly don’t want to talk law all night.”
But as well as increasing the number of networking events and hosting a busy social calendar Mr Allsopp remains acutely aware of some of the challenges facing the profession.
During his year in office he wants to stress the importance of high street firms, as well as highlighting other issues affecting the sector.
They include increased regulation, changes to Legal Aid, which he believes will be a problem going forward, and competition in the shape of Alternative Business Structures (ABSs).
Most Read
“High street solicitors are disappearing and that is very sad,” said Mr Allsopp. “It is important people go and talk to a solicitor on the high street rather than the via the internet, where you don’t get one-to-one contact. I want to say use your local lawyer - these people don’t bite.
“Law is a bit a bit like dental treatment. You don’t expect that online. You wouldn’t expect to communicate with a dentist via the internet or telephone and say fix my problem.
“They can’t do it without seeing you and that is the same with the legal profession. You need people to connect with people. I love the idea of one to one contact and would like to encourage far more people to see their solicitor and discuss their problems with them.
“One of my aims is to bring back life to the high street solicitor.”
An ever-increasing regulatory framework is one of the threats to the high street, but also to the sector as a whole, according to Mr Allsopp.
“We have regulations that make life very tricky for us going forward,” he said. “A lot of people can’t be bothered and are leaving the profession.
“They might have 30 or 40 years service and don’t want to go with a blot on their legal career because they breach a regulation they were not aware of. I think that is very sad.
Don’t miss
“That is not why we qualified as solicitors, we did so to protect the public.”
The problem posed by increasing regulation is a pressing one and has even overtaken the rise of the ABS, according to Mr Allsopp.
“ABSs were perceived as a threat but now that is slowing down,” he said.”The perceived threat now to the profession is regulation..
“The regulations we have now with the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) and the Legal Ombudsman have really put us in a straightjacket.All we are trying to do is a job for our clients. but to do so have to go through all sorts of compliance issues..
“I think the reason many lawyers object to regulations now is they are not allowed to use common sense.
“If something goes wrong they bring in thousands of regulations. Instead of looking after the good guys they bring in a system where we sift out the bad guys. I think that is sad..
“There are too many regulations in the country as a whole - so many pieces of paper - you can’t do anything without having signed a form somewhere.
“Everything has changed, culture has changed and we have to comply rather than produce. We should be a producer first and a complier second but it is the other way around.”
Citing the intervention of the SRA in the collapse of Birmingham law firm Blakemores, Mr Allsopp said: “Blakemores was not a good intervention. I don’t think it was sympathetic to clients or staff and economically it cost a lot of money for the SRA to intervene.
“If we have another intervention how do we cope with it? That is what we need to challenge the SRA on. It has the right to intervene but needs to think about the human factor and the clients.
“It should certainly be protecting clients, that is what the organisation was set up for, but I can’t think of an incident where the client has suffered more than Blakemores.
“Cases went to Stephensons in Wigan and clients must have been thinking ‘where’s my file, what’s happening with my money’. There was never any threat to clients but they had to wait a couple of days to be assured.”