Current Consultations

Ongoing Competence Proposals - Your input needed

Since publishing our response to the 2022 Public Consultation on principles of CPD proposals and undertaking additional workshops in 2023, we have developed a new Ongoing Competence Code which incorporates those high-level principles and feedback received. This proposed Code is intended to replace the current CPD Code and CPD Framework. 

Consultation Materials to review

DRAFT Ongoing Competence Code

Ongoing Competence Consultation and Engagement pack

Presentation slides used within the Ongoing Competence consultation events

Have your say

Respond to our questionnaire, put your questions and observations at this link

Online consultation events 

On 24 and 26 March, we will be running a series of events for CLC Practices and CLC Lawyers to explain the proposed changes in more detail and invite any further feedback you may have prior to us finalising the draft Code and seeking approval from the Legal Services Board. We want to ensure that our proposals are easy to understand, feasible, and that you have the opportunity to discuss any unforeseen impacts of our proposals that you think have not yet been considered but need to be.

We are running four online consultation sessions in the week of 24^th March. Two are looking at how the new code will work for individual lawyers and two will look at what will be expected of practices.

To join, add one of the links below to your diary.

24^th March

Practices – 0900-1000 Add this link to your calendar

Lawyers – 1230-1330 Add this link to your calendar

26^th March

Lawyers – 0900-1000 Add this link to your calendar

Practices – 1230-1330 Add this link to your calendar

In summary, our proposed code:

• aligns our approach with the steer given by our regulator, the Legal Services Board, within their policy statement on Ongoing Competence. 
• replaces the current hourly-based requirement with an activity-based requirement (which 83% of the 2022 consultation respondents supported), with a proportion of these being 'assessed', and it standardises requirements across all CLC lawyers, irrespective of the type of licence they hold.
• identifies Core Topics which form part of everyday practice and which should be refreshed by our Community every few years, as stipulated by the CLC (initially set at every 3 years);
• reflects the annual Risk Agenda (by way of introducing Suggested Topics) to provide helpful direction to CLC lawyers and support them to complete ongoing competence activities on topics which have associated current or emerging risks.
• continues to synchronise the ongoing competence requirements with the existing licensing year, and continues to include CLC sampling of ongoing competence records.
• introduces a practice-level responsibility for ongoing competence (which 84% supported) whereby practices must report the ongoing competence activity of their key compliance personnel - e.g. a CLC Registered manager; HoLP (Head of Legal Practice); HoFA (Head of Finance and Administration); MLRO (Money Laundering Reporting Officer) - annually to the CLC. 
• enables ongoing competence activity to be used by the CLC as a tool for remediation (which 64% supported, and 20% did not have a strong view).