Law Society latest to put boot into "disproportionate" QASA advocacy scheme

The Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA) is disproportionate to the perceived problems surrounding advocacy standards, the Law Society has argued.

In its submission to the fourth and final consultation on the controversial scheme, Chancery Lane said it wanted to restate its “fundamental objections”.

It argued that QASA was “burdensome and likely to be costly for advocates to be re/accredited”.

The Law Society warned that solicitors who do not become accredited under the scheme would lose their rights of audience in the magistrates' court after five years in practice.

“That is such a fundamental change to the profession that the issue should be consulted on,” it said.

Chancery Lane also said that for those advocates undertaking jury trials in the Crown court, the only route to accreditation was by judicial evaluation. It vowed to continuing to press for an alternative route to accreditation via assessment centres.

The Law Society claimed that recent Ministry of Justice data pointed to there being an insufficient number of cases in the Crown Court for all of those advocates required to be accredited to obtain three judicial evaluations in the first 12 months. Chancery Lane believes that the period in which advocates are able to obtain evaluations should be extended.

The Law Society also said it strongly endorsed the provision to enable non-trial advocates to be accredited under the scheme to appear in the Crown Court.

“It has welcomed the transitional arrangements for those solicitors who have recently acquired higher rights of audience so that a solicitor who obtained higher rights in 2010 will not have to be accredited until 2015,” it added. “The Society is adamant that the scheme must apply to all advocates including QCs.”

The Law Society’s comments come just days after the Criminal Bar Association warned of a potential judicial review action over QASA.

The CBA claimed that there had been regulatory overreach by the Bar Standards Board – one of the three regulatory bodies involved in establishing QASA.

In contrast to the Law Society, it criticised the inclusion of QCs in the scheme, arguing that this reduced the rank to a “purely ceremonial honour”.

QASA is set to be introduced in January 2013.

Philip Hoult