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Alex Neil Women who have suffered violence and abuse will benefit from a funding boost of £570,000 to help build stronger and more resilient women’s support groups across Scotland, Social Justice Secretary Alex Neil announced today.

Michael Gove The Law Society of England and Wales has welcomed the Ministry of Justice's (MoJ) decision to abandon plans for the two-tier criminal legal aid contracting regime. Legal aid fee cuts for criminal defence lawyers are to be dropped and the old rates restored following the government's U-t

A legal secretary who stole almost £79,000 from clients and spent the money on shopping sprees has been jailed for two and a half years. Dianne Spragg, 48, from Caerphilly in Wales, forged 65 cheques at Cardiff firm Geldards. The cheques were from “mentally incapacitated” customers.

A Scots law firm whose complaint to the legal complaints watchdog about the conduct of a solicitor from another firm was ruled ineligible has successfully appealed against the decision. The firm complained to the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission that the lawyer may have been guilty of profession

Lord Drummond Young The Inner House of the Court of Session has rejected a law firm's bid to avoid contributing more than £50,000 to the Scottish Solicitors’ Staff Pension Fund £10 million deficit.

The Law Society of Scotland has supported plans to remove the need for suspects to pay a contribution towards the cost of legal advice they receive while held in custody at police stations but has cautioned that fundamental difficulties with legal aid arrangements for police station work remain. Reg

A bill to improve access to justice for survivors of domestic abuse and tackle the rise of so-called revenge porn will be debated at the Scottish Parliament today. The Abusive Behaviour and Sexual Harm Bill, introduced by the Scottish government, will modernise criminal law and strengthen powers for

John Swinney New legislation to introduce a supplement on purchases of additional residential properties has been published by the Scottish Parliament today.

Jennifer Cummings Murray Beith Murray has announced the appointment of Jennifer Cummings as associate within the Edinburgh-based private client firm. The promotion takes effect from 1 February 2016.

Neil Amner Glasgow Chamber of Commerce has installed Neil Amner as its new president for a two-year term.

A law professor's widow who passed away last year has gifted £4 million towards the protection of birds and woodland and to fund research into Parkinson's disease, The Herald reports. Margaret Walker left the bulk of her legacy for The Woodland Trust, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI),

A Scottish human rights lawyer working in Colombia is to give a talk on his experiences in an event organised by the Faculty of Advocates’ Human Rights and Rule of Law Committee. Simon Crabb has been in South America since 2012, and will provide an insight into Colombia’s transition from armed c

The legal profession will look radically different in the coming four years as women come to dominate the profession, small firms shut their doors, publicly funded work diminishes, routine work becomes automated and the public go online to settle disputes. These are the predictions outlined in a new

The Crown has successfully challenged the sentence imposed on a man who pled guilty to attempting to conspire to rape and sexually assault a young girl and to take indecent photographs of her. The Criminal Appeal Court ruled that the sentence of 18 months’ imprisonment imposed was “unduly lenien

An Egyptian national who appealed against a decision of the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, made in agreement with a UN committee, to freeze his assets because he was associated with Al-Qaida has had his appeal unanimously dismissed by the Supreme Court. President of the Sup