Exciting roles on our governing Council

21 July, 2016

Specialist property law regulator seeks new Council members

We are looking for new members for our governing Council to fill roles that will soon become vacant as members come to the end of their maximum terms. The majority of the new roles will begin in April 2017.

There are vacancies for two lay (non-lawyer) members and three lawyer members. The lawyer members will need experience in the conveyancing and probate fields. Recruiting to the non-lawyer roles, the CLC is especially interested in people with experience in marketing or consumer affairs. Full details are available here.

The CLC has achieved some notable successes in recent years, securing the power to issue stand-alone probate licences, receiving a very positive assessment from oversight regulator the Legal Services Board, and achieving very significant shifts in already positive perceptions of it by the profession and its stakeholders. Three-quarters of CLC lawyers believe that being regulated by the CLC is either ‘extremely’ or ‘mostly’ beneficial to their business, that it provides value for money and supports innovation and growth in their business.

The regulator has this year overhauled its professional indemnity insurance regime, achieving major improvements in the interests of regulated firms, consumers and reducing risk to the Compensation Fund that it operates on behalf of the profession. It is also completing the handover of the delivery of education to licence as a CLC lawyer to SQA while it retains control of the standards of entry to the profession.

Now the CLC is looking for new Council Members who can continue to drive the organisation forward.  A major review of regulatory arrangements is underway to ensure that the CLC is in a strong position to continue its original mission to foster competition and innovation in legal services provision.

Chair of the CLC, Dame Janet Paraskeva said: ‘The CLC has made significant progress in the past few years, delivering tailored regulation of specialist property lawyers in a more streamlined and cost-effective way. The turnover of firms we regulate has more than doubled in the past four years after they recovered sooner and quicker than other firms from the 2008 downturn. But there are always new challenges in a fast-changing sector that underpins a major part of the economy. Serving on our governing Council is a chance to drive positive change in an innovative organisation that will have far-reaching impact.’