Speeches by Munt.

“So what have you done? I recognise that you have only been there since January and that I am asking you to speak for your predecessor organisation and leadership, but something, I assume, was done—or was it not?”

“Yes, but your job is to regulate the regulators.”

“I want to ask you, Anna, because you have the history, what conversations took place with the Law Society about the fact that your two organisations were issuing conflicting guidance. What happened? Were there conversations about the fact that you were saying, “Do this” in two different directions?”

“I want to ask you, Anna, because you have the history, what conversations took place with the Law Society about the fact that your two organisations were issuing conflicting guidance. What happened? Were there conversations about the fact that you were saying, “Do this” in two different directions?”

“I am talking about prior to that.”

“So you are asking them to regulate themselves. Where is your place in this? What have you spotted that you feel should be dealt with?”

“Good afternoon. My name is Tessa Munt. I am the Member of Parliament for Wells and Mendip Hills. I am also a director and a vice-chair of WhistleblowersUK, which is a not-for-profit organisation, and vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on penal affairs.”

“But it did not.”

“So you are asking them to regulate themselves. Where is your place in this? What have you spotted that you feel should be dealt with?”

“Do you feel you have the powers and expertise to influence the improvement of services? If 12% of firms are not being open and transparent, and you are asking and asking them to do so but absolutely nothing is happening, then I sense that you do not have the power, but I might be wrong.”

“You can be free, because you are just about to leave.”

“Thank you. I would now like to move to this: in its submission to the ongoing public bodies review of the LSB, the Legal Services Consumer Panel identified a number of consumer-facing reforms, such as meaningful quality indicators and comprehensive price transparency. Those, I understand, remain undelivered, so why is …”

“If you were going to start with a blank sheet of paper, what would we have?”

“If I can pick up on that, Anna, I think you said in 2022 that there was “an appetite” to move towards a single legal services regulator. I wonder whether you still feel that is the right way to go, and whether a single legal services regulator would be preferable to the current situation.”

“What levers do you have to make up that 12%?”

“No, but you have the experience.”

“Yes, but your job is to regulate the regulators.”

“So what have you done? I recognise that you have only been there since January and that I am asking you to speak for your predecessor organisation and leadership, but something, I assume, was done—or was it not?”

“If I return to my question, do you feel that the SRA has the powers and competencies that it needs to regulate new technologies? I can see that you are working on it, but do you feel you have the powers? In the long run, for us this is about access to justice. I can understand how individual firms will populate AI with…”

“I want to ask you about your response to the recent Court of Appeal judgment in Mazur. You said that you will “continue to hold regulators to account” to ensure that there is a clear approach across the sector to reserved legal activities. What does that mean?”