Among the coffee, pastries and exhibitor stands, delegates filed into the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, ready for the opening speech from Richard Mathias in the Eon lounge. After introductions and explanation of the different charities being sponsored by the event, (MacMillian Cancer Support and Alzheimer's Society), Richard welcomed up the first speaker to the stage.
Peter Rodd - Conveyancing Quality Scheme
Joining from Boys and Maughan Solicitors, Peter Rodd's presentation was about the Conveyancing Quality Scheme. He emphasised the idea behind it, primarily to improve conveyancing standards. He also spoke of the most pressing issues currently affecting the scheme, and how they will be overcome in the next few years. The majority of these centred on educating consumers to seek out CQS solicitors, plus increasing awareness among solicitors to build up a CQS trusted community. So far, he explained, there were 1760 accredited member firms signed up, with the overall standard of licensed conveyancers expected to improve as the bad eggs are removed. As bogus firms of solicitors are increasing, the need for a community of high standard conveyancers only becomes more important.
His hopes for the future include an effective electronic central conveyancing portal which will be piloted in 2012-2013, thus enabling the CQS community to work online, but also within the trusted community which makes the conveyancing process more straightforward for solicitors and clients.
Malcolm Gordon - St Giles Legal and Professional Risks
Malcolm Gordon from St Giles Legal and Professional Risks was up next. Through examples of recent conveyancing cases, he outlining the many mistakes in the legal sector, stressing the need to learn by others’ errors to sidestep future ones. He advised legal practices to put in place systems like Lexcel to help manage cases, ensuring that they're completed in timely fashion and to a high standard. Although he didn't make it through all of his 89 slides on the day, you can view the slides via the LFS website.
Jaunita Gobby - Legal Eye
Jaunita Gobby from Legal Eye was next up. Working with law firms to ensure compliance and optimise performance, her presentation summed up perfectly the simple steps solicitors could take to ensure compliance, (with a few chuckles and technical hitches en route). She pointed out that (through Legal Eye's research) of the 72 firms that attended the Conference, over half were not compliant on their website. Although this was reduced from last year (83%), she admitted that there was still work to be done. Over the recent months, there have been a great deal of changes in the legal sector; 600 firms didn’t nominate their COLPs or COFA nominations, SRA relationship managers have been appointed, plus reviews with firms have begun, either through conference calls, or face to face.
Rob Hailstone - Bold Legal
Rob Hailstone, from Bold Legal began his career in the legal sector, but also gained experience in sales, which explains why, when he returned to the law, he was forthright in recruiting clients, well practised in great customer service, always answered the phone and returned clients' calls.
He outlined four challenges facing the legal sector including the stagnant property market, competitors, lender issues and changes to rules and regulations. His predictions for the next year include ABSs adopting a more active role, the need to keep in touch with existing clients, (not just new ones!) and the need to do more personal business even though all the technological advances makes remote contact much easier.
Mortgage lending didn’t sound like the most gripping of topics, but it was a great presentation. Paul Broadhead talked us through the following data during the presentation:
| Gross Lending | |
| Year | Amount (billions) |
| 2007 | £363 |
| 2011 | £141 |
| 2012 | £142 |
| Net Lending | |
| Year | Amount (billions) |
| 2006 | £110 |
| 2007 | £108 |
| 2008 | £41 |
| 2009 | £12 |
| 2010 | £8 |
| 2011 | £9 |
| 2012 | £10 |
He explained that back in 2006, 95-97% was common lending. Nowadays, 62% consumers say gathering a deposit is the biggest inability in not being able to get a mortgage. However, having said this, only 3% have actually been turned down. He summarised his presentation recognising that market conditions remain challenging, there's a long way to go before levels are normal, increased regulation will impact on lending levels, lenders will be looking to the legal industry to demonstrate professionalism and to appropriately deal with those firms which are not fit to practise.
Justin Urquhart Stewart - Seven Investment Management
Personally, my favourite presentation of the day was by Justin Urquhart Stewart from Seven Investment Management, in fact his speech was so engaging that my notes were essentially a few scrawled words, including Greece, Porsche, Ireland and fridges, which were just a handful of the many jokes throughout his time on stage. Speaking in the graveyard spot, after a heavy lunch of sandwiches and stodgy (in a good way) chocolate muffins, he would have done well to get just a few laughs out of the audience, but in actual fact he had everyone giggling for his entire session. Concerning the world economy, a topic which may have made many stifle a yawn, Justin stressed the need for businesses to put their confidence back in the economy to reduce the deficit. It was far from doom and gloom, with Justin reminding the audience that Britain is the 8th largest manufacturer and the 10th largest exporter. He wrapped up his presentation explaining that the UK is damaged but not doomed and that small business start ups are key!
George Kidd - Council for Licensed Conveyers
After a quick afternoon coffee break (with an array of delicious looking cakes), George Kidd was next up, talking about the Council for Licensed Conveyancers. He talked through the stats first, explaining that Licensed Conveyancers carry out over 125,000 transactions a year (excluding re-mortgages) with a total value of around £20 billion; the Land Registry figures suggest this represents about 15% of all transactions. He highlighted that the level of complaints are low, only 152 across the 125,000 transactions and of 39 cases only 4 required formal decisions, with just 1 requiring a fine.
Paul Collins - Lloyds
Next up was Paul Collins from Lloyds, talking about applications to, and panels. Based on the fact that there is £1 million a week lost to solicitor fraud, Paul explained that the selective vetting of firms is key to removing the bad eggs, and this in turn reduces bureaucracy, rather than monitoring the whole thing. Lloyds currently has a panel of around 3,900 firms of all shapes and sizes, including, he reminded the audience, Sole Practitioners which do not increase risk.
Tracey Carr - Santander
Tracey Carr from Santander was the last speaker of the day. Although she spoke of the problems which Santander have experienced over the past 18 months, she spent a great deal of time talking about the ways in which Santander and solicitors can work together to ensure improvements for the future. She explained that the large losses experienced by Santander were deemed to be from firms without any transactions in the last 12 months. England and Wales were targeted, with the majority of losses attributed to those regions, (Scotland was, and is, treated in a different way). The removals made during the first cutbacks reduced risk by 80%. The robust vetting process now in place was needed from this point onwards. The future outlook described by Tracey included a more engaging, close relationship between Santander and solicitors, as she encouraged firms to keep Santander aware of any material, bank account or staff changes. She explained that Santander was trying to be become more proactive rather than reactive, pledging to have more communication with firms before they’re removed from panels in the future.