Chair’s Board update February 2022

Jonathan Rees, CILEx Regulation Chair

In a productive session, some key matters were discussed. We firstly agreed a consultation to change the Enforcement Rules to allow remote online hearings on a permanent basis, once the Covid rules expire later this year. Our experience to date, is that these have worked well for all parties, but the new rules will also allow for face-to-face meetings where appropriate.

There was a good discussion on the LSB’s proposals for new rules to test the ongoing competence of regulated individuals. We support these in principle, and CRL is well placed since we already have our own competency framework. But we do think there are many important issues to be considered, not least extending the proposed implementation timeframe, a fuller analysis of costs and benefits and understanding better, the equality and social mobility implications of the LSB’s proposals. We look forward to continuing the debate.

We also agreed an updated action plan on our governance following the LSB well-led review of the Faculty Office.

Finally, we reviewed plans for our roundtable next month which is the next step of the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion strategy published last month.

In addition, we reviewed our end-year financial outturn, agreed a revised Annual Business plan and risk register, and discussed how we can provide a better service for our regulated community whilst reducing the costs to them.

Our next planned Board catch-up is on 22 March with our next full meeting in May.

Full meeting details can be found on our website.