Bar the dodgy lawyers
Watchdog targets struck-off solicitors
The Law Society of Scotland are worried by the growing number of unqualified and banned people offering the public advice.
Culprits include solicitors who have been struck off but continue to call themselves lawyers.
There are also a growing number of organisations, including claims companies, who are giving legal advice but are not registered with the Law Society.
The watchdog want the Scottish Government to make the word “lawyer” a protected and regulated legal term in the same way as “solicitor”.
It is a criminal offence to pose as a solicitor.
However, there are no restrictions on people calling themselves lawyers even if they have criminal convictions.
The Law Society are also calling for the term to be restricted to professionals registered with them.
One solicitor said: “If you pose as a solicitor when you are not, you could go to prison.
“However anyone can say they are a lawyer, even without any legal training. ” This move is long overdue.” One ex-solicitor calling himself a lawyer is Cameron Fyfe, a former partner in Glasgow firm Ross Harper.
Fyfe was struck off by the Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal in 2016.
He was found guilty of holding back legal aid money which should been paid to expert witnesses hired by the firm. Instead the money was used to keep his firm afloat.
He has since set up Cameron Fyfe Claims – offering to seek compensation for accidents, historical abuse and medical negligence.
On his website last week, Fyfe described himself as one of Scotland’s most prominent lawyers l and makes no mention of o being struck offoff. He told the Sunday S Mail that he was not doing d anything wrong.
Fyfe added: ”The Law Society have h not said to me that there i si a problem with me using the term t lawyer.
“They said I could not use the word solicitor which I never do. “I’m a qualified lawyer, I have a law degree and I am a lawyer. The term lawyer is too general for it to be protected by law.”
In 2009, James McDonald was convicted of fraud at Edinburgh Sheriff Court for impersonating a lawyer.
McDonald, then 61, who also has a conviction for counterfeiting, had taken payment for giving legal advice on immigration cases to five unsuspecting asylum seekers.
In 2015 three judges refused to allow McDonald, from Stirling, to represent underworld figure Russell Stirton at the Criminal Appeal Court in Edinburgh.
They ruled that the only people who are able to address the court are qualified advocates and solicitor advocates.
Stirton was trying to obtain a private prosecution against the then Lord Advocate, Frank Mulholland and described McDonald as his friend.
In April this year, Stirton, 58, was cleared of handing a £7.8million stash of heroin to a lorry driver to smuggle into the UKUK. Recent research foufound nine out of 10 ScScot t ish adults ththink there should be a curb on who can call themselvesthem lawyers.
Previous Previous re research showed 63 per cent did not know there was a difference between a solicitor and a lawyer.
The Scottish Government announced a major review of the Scottish legal profession in April last year.
If you pose as a solicitor and you are not, you could go to prison