Latest news with #LawSocietyofScotland
The Herald Scotland
2 days ago
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
Law chief stands down after over 40 years with same firm
Thorntons said Colin Graham, its former chair, is stepping down as a partner after more than four decades. Mr Graham, 64, joined Thornton, Dickie and Brand as it then was in 1984 and was appointed partner four years later at the age of 27 to Thornton Oliver. He served eight years as chair, starting in 2016, and has seen Thorntons 'grow to become one of the country's largest legal practices, with over 600 colleagues and partners'. To support the firm in the run-up to his retirement as a partner, he took up a role as senior partner at Thorntons, a key leadership position driving forward a number of projects for the firm, while retaining his ambassadorial role representing Thorntons and its people across Scotland and beyond. He will now act as a consultant to the business. READ MORE: Mr Graham, who is described by the Dundee-headquartered company as one of the best-known business figures in Tayside, specialised in conveyancing law and is recognised as one of the country's leading experts in the field, presenting for the Law Society of Scotland and other organisations on complex cases, and helping inform changes in the law. He said: 'I am enormously grateful for the many messages of support I have received from partners, colleagues, clients and friends. I have always sought to ensure that Thorntons focused on doing the right thing for our people, for our clients and for our communities. 'I am proud that, as we have undergone significant growth, particularly over the past five years, we have preserved the direct, personal client approach for which the firm has been known for decades and looked after our colleagues. That culture is what sets us apart.' Lesley Larg, the firm's managing partner, said: 'Colin is rightly regarded as being 'Mr Thorntons' and has played a vital role in leading the firm with a rare combination of business insight, integrity and compassion for our people. 'He is enormously well-respected for his tremendous leadership and for his insistence on adherence to the highest professional and personal standards at all times. It is no coincidence that his eight years as chair saw the longest and most sustained period of growth in the firm's history. 'The impact he has made on our business will never be repeated, and I know I speak for many, many members of the Thorntons team when I say that he has been a uniquely positive influence on my own career. We are all looking forward to his ongoing, valuable contribution in his important new role.' As well as his decades-long leadership position within Thorntons, Mr Graham has played a leading role in many other organisations over the years, including as chair of RSPCC Dundee, treasurer of the Ninewells Cancer Research Appeal, captain of Dundee High School FP Rugby Club and as chair of NHS Tayside Primary Care Disciplinary Panel. Thorntons can trace its roots back to 1857.
Scottish Sun
03-06-2025
- General
- Scottish Sun
Top Scots lawyer dodges jail after being unmasked as evil child sex abuse predator
The sicko shared child sex abuse images and chatted online with other beasts about molesting kids 'DESPICABLE' Top Scots lawyer dodges jail after being unmasked as evil child sex abuse predator Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) A CHARITIES lawyer exposed by The Scottish Sun as a paedophile was spared jail. Alan Eccles, 43, was tagged for eight months and handed 300 hours of unpaid work as well as three years' supervision. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 2 Alan Eccles shared child sex abuse images and chatted online with other beasts Credit: Law Society of Scotland 2 The paedophile lawyer will be on the sex offenders register for three years Credit: Steve Welsh We told how the sicko shared child sex abuse images and chatted online with other beasts about molesting kids. Eccles, from Bearsden, near Glasgow, also shared an intimate pic of a woman between October and November 2023. His lawyer John Scullion KC told Paisley Sheriff Court: 'The offences took place when his mental health was bad. He accepts full responsibility.' Passing sentence, Sheriff Bruce Erroch told first offender Eccles: "You are a mature and plainly intelligent man who made a deliberate decision to act as you did. "You must have known the risks involved. Significant psychological harm was caused by your crimes. "Such crimes are not victimless crimes. I've considered the aggravating factors of all of your offences. "Your behaviour was, in short, despicable. You are a man of good nature who appears in the court without any criminal record and you have carried out good public service. "Taking all the relevant factors into account I intend to reduce the prison sentence to a high-level community payback order. Such measures will be put in places to protect the public." The perv will also be on the sex offenders register for three years. He is a specialist in third sector legal issues and has assisted a number of charities. Ringleaders in Scotland's biggets ever paedophle ring spotted out and about in Edinburgh After Eccles' vile crimes came to light, his profile was scrubbed from the Law Society of Scotland website. His account on business networking site LinkedIn was also removed.
Edinburgh Reporter
14-05-2025
- Business
- Edinburgh Reporter
New Chief Executive named at The Law Society of Scotland
General Counsel, Executive Director and dual-qualified solicitor Ben Kemp has been appointed to become the new Chief Executive Officer of the Law Society of Scotland. Mr Kemp will join the Law Society in August from the professional body which represents and regulates actuaries, the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA), where he has worked primarily as General Counsel and Executive Director, with a recent 15-month tenure as interim CEO. A University of Edinburgh LLB graduate, Mr Kemp qualified as a Scottish solicitor in 2001 and has worked in private practice in both Scotland and London, before moving in-house to the IFoA in 2012. Law Society of Scotland President Susan Murray said: 'We are delighted that Ben will be joining the Law Society in the coming months as our new CEO. This follows a comprehensive and exacting recruitment process. 'Ben stood out from a strong field of candidates as the right person to lead and develop the Society, as well as support the wider Scottish solicitor profession and the people it serves. He is joining us at an exciting time as we prepare for generational reforms around regulation and as the legal sector embraces technological and cultural change. 'We were impressed with Ben's wide experience of the legal sector and his approach towards leading a membership organisation, alongside his commitment to working collaboratively with our members, our Society colleagues and our key stakeholders, to navigate challenges, embrace opportunities and represent the profession.' Ben Kemp said: 'I am excited and privileged to be joining the Law Society of Scotland later this year. As a longstanding member, becoming chief executive presents a tremendous opportunity to support and contribute to the Law Society's important work. 'We're at a pivotal moment for Scotland's legal sector and I plan to hit the ground running once in post, with a focus on long awaited reforms to how legal services are regulated and on supporting Law Society members in their work and advocating on the issues that matter to them.' Kevin Lang will continue as Law Society interim CEO in preparation for an ordered transition to Mr Kemp, following the departure of previous Chief Executive Diane McGiffen last month. Like this: Like Related
The Herald Scotland
14-05-2025
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
Ben Kemp appointed as new Law Society of Scotland CEO
He qualified as a Scottish solicitor in 2001 and has worked in private practice in both Scotland and London. Law Society of Scotland President Susan Murray said: 'We are delighted that Ben will be joining the Law Society in the coming months as our new CEO. This follows a comprehensive and exacting recruitment process. 'Ben stood out from a strong field of candidates as the right person to lead and develop the Society, as well as support the wider Scottish solicitor profession and the people it serves. He is joining us at an exciting time as we prepare for generational reforms around regulation and as the legal sector embraces technological and cultural change. Read More 'We were impressed with Ben's wide experience of the legal sector and his approach towards leading a membership organisation, alongside his commitment to working collaboratively with our members, our Society colleagues and our key stakeholders, to navigate challenges, embrace opportunities and represent the profession. Ben Kemp said: 'I am excited and privileged to be joining the Law Society of Scotland later this year. As a longstanding member, becoming chief executive presents a tremendous opportunity to support and contribute to the Law Society's important work. 'We're at a pivotal moment for Scotland's legal sector and I plan to hit the ground running once in post, with a focus on long awaited reforms to how legal services are regulated and on supporting Law Society members in their work and advocating on the issues that matter to them.' Kevin Lang will continue as Law Society interim CEO in preparation for an ordered transition to Mr Kemp, following the departure of previous Chief Executive Diane McGiffen last month.
The National
12-05-2025
- Politics
- The National
Domestic abuse survivors being let down by legal aid
My mother and I saw the failures of Scottish legal aid first hand after fleeing more than a decade of coercive control. And at every step, women of colour face barriers made worse by a lack of cultural awareness, urgency, and empathy. Until legal aid improves not just in access but also in quality, it will continue to retraumatise those it is meant to protect. Accessing a civil legal aid solicitor in Scotland is nearly impossible. Survivors often face complex legal battles – divorces involving property, fraud, or serving papers to abusers who have fled abroad. Few solicitors can afford to take these cases on at legal aid rates. As the 2024 Annual Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB) report shows, legal aid firms are in steep decline, leaving survivors stranded. We called more than 100 firms from the Law Society of Scotland and Scottish Women's Rights Centre directories. The few who answered said we might not qualify for legal aid. Although we were destitute, the board treated a potential future claim to a remortgaged house – requiring the abuser's co-operation – as evidence of my mother's wealth. Meanwhile, the abuser, safely abroad, weaponised expensive lawyers. We had no solicitor to respond, no safety net. Even with a solicitor, survivors must reapply to SLAB for every court order and justify urgency each time, with no real-time support. Solicitors often step back until funding is approved, leaving survivors – many of them non-native speakers – to navigate a complex system alone. Children are often pulled in as default interpreters. I usually find the stereotype of migrant kids doing their parents' paperwork offensive. But coercive control erodes confidence. Despite my mother's education, years of fear and gaslighting left her unable to navigate the process alone. So I stepped in to translate. As an adult, I could bear that burden – but in other families, the daughter filling out the legal aid form might still be in her school uniform. This lack of support not only isolates survivors, it also places a burden on children already being forced to grow up too soon. Our first application for a civil protection order was rejected, exposing the board's lack of cultural awareness. Following Sri Lankan custom, our abuser's documents listed both his cultural and given names. The board misread this as my mother trying to divorce two men and denied our claim. Worse, they cited the abuser's possible absence from the UK – a common issue for migrant survivors – as another reason to refuse. Despite an active police warrant, he travels freely between Sri Lanka and the UK and his whereabouts are unknown. Scottish legal aid fails women of colour not only through access barriers but also in the quality of service provided. Once my mother was finally granted advice and assistance through legal aid, the support she received was slow, impersonal, and devoid of empathy. During the entire course of her case, her solicitors never saw her face. Like many legal aid clients post-pandemic, our only contact was through crackling phone lines and unanswered emails. Recounting rape and coercive control to a voice on the phone – with no warmth, no facial cues – is profoundly alienating. The delays were staggering. Just securing a phone appointment took weeks. There was unanswered emails, gatekeeping by legal secretaries, missed calls, and repeated cancellations. When we learned a bank had repossessed and was trying to sell our family home, we begged our solicitor to get an injunction. If the house was sold, then we would have to rely on the abuser's co-operation to claim equity. However, he had fled abroad again. It took us nearly two months to get a phone appointment. The solicitor changed or missed the call five times. Weeks of emails – including those from Women's Aid, which stepped in on our behalf – were ignored. Only after a senior Women's Aid practitioner intervened, citing my mother's cancer diagnosis and the impact the stress of this case was causing to her health, did the firm finally respond. By then, the house had already been sold. The solicitor didn't even know until we told her. This wasn't an isolated experience. Many women of colour on legal aid feel deprioritised, while those who pay privately receive timely, personalised support. Legal aid clients, who are disproportionately women of colour, are left chasing solicitors who offer generic advice, disconnected from the realities of migrant survivors. Our solicitor dismissed the cross-border complexities of our case, assuring my mother, wrongly, that the law could force her fugitive abuser to agree to a fair settlement. When the house sale went through and our hopes of equity vanished abroad, she deflected blame, implying my mother had misunderstood her poor advice due to a language barrier. She even suggested my mother sounded confused and needed a translator. Survivors can't even hold poor legal service to account, as doing so risks losing the only representation they have. Filing a complaint with the Scottish Legal Aid Board feels impossible when there are so few solicitors willing to take on legal aid cases in the first place. As the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill moves through the Scottish Parliament, we have a rare chance to make civil legal aid truly work for survivors. While the bill includes important measures to prevent retraumatisation in court, many survivors never even make it that far. Expanding legal aid eligibility and funding more firms is vital, but it only solves part of the problem. The most devastating failures come after survivors find representation – when delays, miscommunication, and impersonal service compound trauma. For women from migrant and minority communities, these failures are intensified by cultural blind spots and a lack of trauma-informed care. Coercive control thrives on making victims feel isolated and helpless. When legal processes are cold, confusing, or dismissive, they become just another form of control. For my mother, legal aid promised protection but the system felt more like her abuser than her advocate. Unless we rehumanise the legal aid service and rebuild it with the needs of diverse survivors at its core, victims' rights will remain theoretical. We cannot settle for paper rights and promised equities. Civil legal aid must be reformed – urgently and equitably. The name of the writer of this piece is being withheld
