The chairperson of the Criminal Bar Association, Nigel Lithman QC, has voiced his opposition to the government’s Quality Assurance Standards for Advocacy scheme, as well as its plans to cut 30% of all legal aid fees.

City firms Nabarro and Simmons & Simmons have both won national recognition for the quality of their work experience and internship schemes at the National Council for Work Experience 2012 awards.

The Legal Aid Agency has been criticised for adding to funding problems which have created “advice deserts” around the UK by setting a maximum £35 case fee for immigration telephone advisers.

This year’s Future Legal Mind competition has been won by Amy Loughrey, an undergraduate student at the University of York, and Lukas Hamilton Eddy, a postgraduate student at City University, London.

US law firm Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson has launched an in-house pupillage scheme.

The Bar Standards Board has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Inns of Court to recognise the “vital” role played by the Inns for aspiring barristers.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has announced that non-practising solicitors will need to pay a £20 charge to stay on the roll from next year. The change will affect around 60,000 non-practising solicitors who are already on the roll.

London South Bank University has released a manual on how to establish and manage a drop-in legal advice clinic.

The Legal Services Consumer Panel, the law watchdog, has claimed in its submission to the Legal Education and Training Review that legal training is failing because it is too generalised.

Solicitors representing young people in the youth courts are to receive specialist support from the Solicitors Regulation Authority to help them meet the needs of their young clients. 

The Legal Education Foundation has announced the appointment of two new governors, while confirming that its latest round of grants total over £500,000.

A legal research website which relies on crowdsourcing and user ratings for its content was launched last week.

For the second year in a row, The College of Law and the International Bar Association are offering scholarships towards fees for the full-time LLM in International Legal Practice, which runs at CoL's Moorgate and Manchester centres.

The presence of multiple-choice questions (MCQ) in the new Solicitors Qualifying Exam (SQE) will make the assessment more rigorous than critics think, according to the person in charge of designing the SQE framework.

The London Borough of Hillingdon has appointed four school leavers as legal assistant apprentices in its legal services department.

Norton Rose Fulbright has announced its partnership with the Financial and Legal Skills Partnership through the 'Get In Get On' initiative.

The Law Teacher of the Year Award 2011 has gone to University of Westminster professor of law and theory Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority has launched a consultation on a new standardised system for assessing trainees, under which all those wishing to qualify as a solicitor would have to sit the same professional exam. 

The Law Society invites people to join the legal profession march at this year's Pride London parade on Saturday 2 July.

Magic circle giant Allen & Overy has joined top-end firms Clifford Chance, Hogan Lovells, Herbert Smith and Travers Smith in signing up to a specialist agency which actively recruits high-achieving African Caribbean graduates.