The SRA says it is reshaping its senior leadership as part of an “operational excellence” drive. It is trying to become a faster, sharper regulator, with better supervision, better use of data, and quicker decisions. It is creating four new executive director roles and says the changes are meant to help it tackle bigger sector risks and rebuild trust.
The SRA is not making these changes in calm waters. In recent years it has taken heavy criticism over a number of major failures. The most serious was Axiom Ince. The Legal Services Board commissioned an independent review, which led to enforcement action against the SRA. The LSB later said more than £60 million in client funds may have been misappropriated and found the SRA’s handling of the matter fell short.
Then came SSB Law. The SRA itself apologised in October 2025 and accepted all recommendations from an independent review into failures in its handling of the firm. The LSB said the review found the SRA had failed to protect consumers affected by the collapse and started enforcement action there too.
More recently, the PM Law intervention has added to the sense of a regulator under real pressure. On 21 April 2026, the SRA said its investigation involved a suspected fraud and the improper removal and misuse of around £39.5 million of client funds. It described the intervention as one of the largest and most complex it has ever undertaken.
So yes, there have been serious failings. Too many. And it would be hard to pretend a new set of job titles, on its own, fixes any of them.
But there is still a more hopeful way to read this. Regulators do not usually announce a need to rebuild trust unless they know the old model is no longer good enough. The SRA is at least signalling it has understood the scale of the problem. It says it wants to improve decision-making times, manage caseloads better, and become more proactive in spotting risks earlier. Those are exactly the areas which have looked weakest when big firms have gone wrong.
Supervision means watching firms more closely before trouble becomes a collapse. Risk and data means using information better, instead of letting warning signs sit in separate boxes. General counsel and compliance should mean clearer internal decision-making. None of this is glamorous, but regulation rarely is. Often the real improvement is not a dramatic intervention. It is spotting the danger six months earlier.
The SRA does need to regain credibility. Lawyers do not want to be paying through the teeth for a regulator that is bad for business. It has earned the criticism it has received but if this restructure is a move towards earlier action, clearer judgment and a safer sector, then it may turn out to be more than just a tidy internal reshuffle.
I think for the SRA, lawyers and the public, that would be a welcome change.
Author: Joseph Stewart-Doyle
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