5 Apr 2022

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 5 APRIL 2022

The Bar Standards Board (BSB) has today published its Strategy for the next three years and its Business Plan for 2022-23.

The Strategy, which was agreed by the Board on 31 March and reflects views offered by stakeholders during a recent public consultation, sets out the BSB’s high level strategic priorities and proposes five key strategic aims for the BSB:

  • Efficiency – delivering core regulatory operations quickly, economically and to a high standard.
  • Standards – ensuring that barristers provide a high quality and responsive service throughout their careers.
  • Equality – promoting equality, diversity and inclusion at the Bar and at the BSB and the profession’s ability to serve diverse consumers.
  • Access – promoting consumer understanding of legal services and choice and good value in using those services (covering both the supply of, and demand for, barristers’ services).
  • Independence – strengthening the BSB’s independence, capability self-confidence and credibility.

The strategy is set in the context of the BSB’s statutory regulatory objectives and takes into account the Legal Services Board’s priorities.  The document also lists the BSB’s key priorities over the next three years under each strategic aim.

The Business Plan focuses on the BSB’s priorities for the coming year set against the same five strategic aims and statutory regulatory objectives.  The Plan also explains how the BSB intends to allocate its budget for the year.

The Director General, Mark Neale, said:

“Our Strategy sets out a new vision for the BSB that “We will ensure that the BSB regulates the Bar in the public interest by promoting high standards, equality and access to justice”. Central to that vision are our core regulatory operations.  We agree with those who responded to our consultation that our top priority must be to ensure that we regulate the Bar as efficiently as we can.   We must in particular deliver our core regulatory operations more quickly, with no loss of quality or rigour.  To that end, all our work has been carefully prioritised so that we can focus on doing fewer things better.  While we want to enhance our effectiveness and independence as an organisation, we also know that not everything we want to achieve is best achieved through regulation, so we want to work in partnership with others where we can.”

ENDS

Notes to editors

About the Bar Standards Board

Our mission is to regulate barristers and specialised legal services businesses in England and Wales in the public interest. For more information about what we do visit: http://bit.ly/1gwui8t

Contact: For all media enquiries call: 020 7611 4691 or email [email protected].

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