Practice rights: your questions answered

With a new assessment-only route to obtaining practice rights now approved, CILEX answers your questions on the importance of practice rights, gaining CILEX Lawyer status and the options available to Chartered Legal Executives depending on experience and specialism

CILEX has two distinct and separate roles, one as the professional body which supports the education, development and interest of specialist legal practitioners, and the other is as the Approved Regulator for those practitioners under the Legal Services Act 2007.

CILEX has a duty to delegate the day-to-day regulatory activities for our members to a separate and independently run organisation, currently delegating these activities to CILEx Regulation.

Since 2014, it has been possible for CILEX members to obtain practice rights, which essentially means that they can be authorised by CILEx Regulation to carry out a reserved legal activity or a regulated activity.

Conveyancing and probate rights are open to any grade of membership, provided they meet the relevant requirements set by the regulator. Litigation and advocacy for civil, criminal, or family proceedings, and immigration advice and services practice rights can only be obtained by Chartered Legal Executives.

Upon qualification as a Chartered Legal Executive, the reserved legal activity that you are authorised to undertake is ‘the administration of oaths’. This is referred to on the Practising Certificate as being authorised to exercise the powers of a Commissioner for Oaths.

Until recently, the only way in which these rights could be obtained would be to demonstrate your knowledge, skills, and experience in the area in which you are seeking practice rights by a mixture of using previous examinations to demonstrate knowledge, logbook sheets, and supporting evidence, to demonstrate skills, and portfolios to demonstrate experience.

A new route to obtain practice rights

On 30 March 2022, following an application by CILEx Regulation, the Legal Services Board approved a new route to obtaining practice rights which has been developed by CILEx Regulation, specifically aimed at Chartered Legal Executives with at least five years’ qualifying employment.

This new route offers an alternative to the current portfolio route and gives two different options depending upon the experience you hold. For example, if you are a Chartered Legal Executive with five years’ experience working in the legal sector, and two years’ experience in the specialist area in which you are seeking practice rights then you can choose an assessment only route. If you are a Chartered Legal Executive with five years’ experience working in the legal sector, but without two years’ experience in the area in which you are seeking practice rights, you can apply using the training and assessment route.

A number of your Professional Board colleagues were amongst the first to pilot the new route and were successful in obtaining their authorisation. In the coming weeks we will be sharing their experiences and practical top-tips.

What does this mean for me as a Chartered Legal Executive?

The recommendation that you obtain practice rights is as a direct result of changes within the legal profession, and to support you. It is about authorisation. The use by employers of non-authorised persons for reserved or regulated activities is coming under greater scrutiny. CILEX believes that within a couple of years, operating freely under a firm-level regulatory regime without the relevant practice rights will be extremely difficult, if it is even possible at all. We have already seen this beginning, with the Land Registry definition of ‘conveyancer’ only including those who are authorised for reserved instrument activities, and the more recent move by the probate registry to online applications which need to be completed by authorised persons.

CILEX wants you to obtain practice rights so that you can practice without restriction.

CILEX recommends Chartered Legal Executives should all obtain practice rights if the area in which they are working is within the reserved or regulated activity. Obtaining them will ensure you can call yourself a CILEX Lawyer, because with these additional practice rights you can be considered equivalent to other authorised persons in your area of practice.

Obtaining these practice rights, and calling yourself a CILEX Lawyer, is crucial to your career. The increasing digitisation of the legal profession (accelerated because of the pandemic and remote working), and the tightening up of previous ways non-authorised people can deal with matters, means that the environment in which you are working in as a legal profession is changing.

What is a CILEX Lawyer?

CILEX Lawyer status will be awarded by CILEX to current Chartered Legal Executives who either have or will have completed professional development and demonstrated their competence against the additional regulatory standards to obtain practice rights authorisation. The CILEX Lawyer brand acts as a kite mark, reflecting the standards required of our members.

CILEX Lawyers can undertake one or more of the reserved/regulated legal activities without supervision as a result of holding those independent practice rights in their specialist area. It is the additional authorisation which establishes CILEX Lawyers as having parity with solicitors working in their practice area.

What can I do as a Chartered Legal Executive to call myself a CILEX Lawyer?

You are permitted to call yourself a CILEX Lawyer if you:

• Already hold practice rights in your specialist practice area;
• Commit to achieving practice rights authorisation by 31 December 2023; or
• Make a declaration, and thereafter make such a declaration annually, that you do not work in an area which is reserved or regulated, and therefore will not require practice rights. In advance of your 2023 renewals, we will be giving you the opportunity to ensure your details are up to date, and this will include a short application/declaration.

This is relevant if you are working outside of an area which is regulated or reserved. To call yourself a CILEX Lawyer, you will need to undertake the learning “Ethics and Professional Responsibility in context”. This will be for your professional development and can be used to meet some of your annual CPD requirements.

If I don’t need practice rights, or decide that I do not want to obtain them, will I lose my Chartered Legal Executive status?

No, your status will not be affected or downgraded. You will still hold a Practising Certificate as a Chartered Legal Executive and will remain a Fellow of the Institute and able to use the designatory letters FCILEX.

What are the next steps?

If you are interested in obtaining practice rights, you can take a look at the current portfolio option here: Practitioner Application - CILEx Regulation, and if you want to register your interest in the new assessment or learning and assessment route with the regulator, you can here: Practice Rights - expression of interest form - CILEx Regulation.