Services
Regulatory & Professional Discipline
Practical advice and preparation when your professional conduct is under scrutiny.
An investigation or disciplinary allegation can affect your work, income, reputation and plans for the future. The process may begin with a complaint or request for information, followed by unfamiliar procedures and a deadline for your response.
RWS provides non-reserved advice, evidence review, assistance with responses and strategic preparation for regulatory and professional disciplinary matters.
The first task is to understand the allegation, the evidence relied on and the stage the process has reached. From there, Ryan can help you prepare an accurate account, identify the issues that need attention and assess the available options.
Ryan Williams is currently suspended from practice as a solicitor. He works through RWS as an independent legal consultant, providing non-reserved services only. RWS is not an SRA-authorised law firm. Please read the Regulatory Information for his current status and the limits of the service.
Experience of the process
Ryan Williams has direct personal experience of regulatory proceedings. After ending his solicitors' retainer, he personally handled important aspects of his own case.
He has also assisted another solicitor in a separate regulatory matter and supported a social worker with an appeal against an adverse decision.
These experiences inform his approach to preparation and his understanding of the pressure on the person involved. He brings his wider dispute-resolution experience to the examination of documents, competing accounts and procedural issues.
His experience of handling his own case does not give RWS authority to conduct proceedings or exercise reserved rights of audience for someone else. The service offered here is advice and preparation within the scope set out below.
Who RWS can assist
RWS welcomes enquiries from solicitors, social workers and other professionals seeking assistance with an investigation, disciplinary allegation or adverse regulatory decision.
Each enquiry is assessed against the relevant regulator's rules, the work required and RWS's permitted scope. This may involve a response in a non-reserved process, an independent review or organising the evidence for the client's instructions to an authorised practitioner. Any proposed working relationship with an existing legal team must be checked before an instruction is accepted.
Assistance at each stage
Initial complaints and requests for information
The first response can shape the way a concern is understood. It needs to answer the questions asked, explain the relevant facts and avoid conclusions that the evidence does not support.
RWS can help review the complaint, identify the applicable issues, organise the documents and prepare a draft response where that work falls within its non-reserved scope. The submission of any response and responsibility for the regulatory process must be agreed clearly.
Where reporting duties, confidentiality or other professional obligations arise, those issues need to be considered before information is submitted.
Investigations and evidence review
An investigation may involve witness accounts, emails, messages, records of meetings or an internal report. The significance of a document often depends on its date, context and relationship to the rest of the evidence.
RWS can analyse the material, prepare a chronology, compare accounts and identify gaps, inconsistencies or unsupported assumptions.
Where relevant, this includes examining whether the evidence supports the allegation as formulated and whether further information could materially affect the response.
SRA matters and preparation for SDT proceedings
For solicitors, a complaint may lead to requests for information, an investigation, a proposed regulatory decision or a referral to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.
RWS can assist with understanding the issues, reviewing the documents and preparing factual explanations and written representations within its non-reserved scope. Where SDT proceedings are involved, RWS can provide document analysis, factual chronologies and a summary of issues for the client's instructions to an authorised legal team, subject to the permitted working arrangements.
RWS does not act as the solicitor conducting the proceedings or offer representation at the hearing. Formal procedural work and representation must be arranged separately with a practitioner or representative entitled to undertake them.
Disclosure and procedural concerns
A concern about fairness needs to be specific. It may involve missing documents, conflicting accounts, an opportunity to respond, the way an investigation was conducted or the reasons given for a decision.
RWS can help identify the material in question, explain why it matters and prepare focused requests or representations.
The assessment should consider both the alleged procedural problem and its practical effect on the case.
Preparation for a disciplinary hearing
A hearing requires the factual account, documents and disputed issues to be organised coherently.
RWS can assist with factual chronologies, document analysis, summaries of the client's account and schedules of disputed points. This material can help the client explain the matter to counsel or another authorised practitioner. RWS can also help identify which parts of the evidence require closer examination.
The assistance provided will depend on the forum and the agreed scope. These services do not include appearing as the client's hearing representative, conducting proceedings or preparing reserved court documents. Representation must be arranged separately with someone entitled to undertake it.
Mitigation, insight and remediation
Where conduct is admitted or a finding has been made, the next stage may concern its seriousness, the appropriate sanction and the evidence of steps taken since the events.
RWS can help prepare a factual mitigation account and organise relevant material, such as training, changes in working practices, supporting references or other evidence of remediation.
The position on disputed allegations must remain clear. Mitigation should be grounded in the actual facts and the requirements of the relevant professional framework.
Adverse decisions and possible challenges
An adverse decision may need to be examined for an error in the findings, the reasoning, the procedure or the sanction. A challenge requires an identified route and supportable grounds.
RWS can review the decision and relevant material, identify possible issues for further advice and organise the factual background for the client's instructions to an appropriately authorised practitioner. This can help the client assess whether to pursue an appeal or court challenge.
RWS does not prepare or submit formal court appeal documents, issue or conduct a judicial review, or manage court proceedings on the client's behalf.
Time limits may be short. Disagreement with the outcome alone does not establish a ground of appeal, and an appeal may not provide a complete rehearing.
A second opinion on an existing matter
You may want an independent view of a proposed response, an investigation report, a particular allegation or the strategy already being followed.
RWS can undertake a focused review without requiring a change to your existing legal team. The work can be confined to a specific issue, with its purpose and limits agreed at the outset.
A considered response
Ryan's approach is to establish what the documents show and what the regulator needs to determine.
That means identifying which allegations are disputed, which facts can properly be accepted and where further evidence or explanation is needed. It also means giving a frank assessment of arguments that are weak or unlikely to affect the decision.
A clear response should engage with the substance of the concern, supported by the relevant evidence. The aim is to help you decide what to do next and prepare that step carefully.
Costs and the extent of the instruction
A regulatory matter can require different levels of assistance at different stages. RWS can be instructed for a particular document, a defined review or continuing advice and preparation.
The scope and charging basis will be agreed before work begins. Potential expenditure on counsel or another practitioner can be considered when planning the next stage.
Where a regulator or tribunal may seek costs, that exposure should also form part of the assessment. The basis on which costs are recoverable varies between regimes.
Questions about regulatory and disciplinary matters
The scope of RWS's work
Ryan's suspension means he cannot practise as a solicitor. RWS is an independent legal consultancy providing non-reserved advice, evidence analysis, assistance with permitted responses and strategic preparation.
It does not conduct litigation, exercise reserved rights of audience or undertake reserved instrument activities. These services do not include preparing, filing or serving reserved court documents, managing proceedings on a client's behalf or representing a client at a hearing. Any required formal representation or reserved work must be arranged separately with someone entitled to undertake it.
The work available in a particular matter depends on the regulator, the stage reached, the applicable rules, the agreed instruction and any approval required for the proposed working arrangements. The instruction will identify the deadlines and which steps the client or their authorised representative needs to take. RWS's advice and preparation do not amount to taking over the proceedings.
Discuss your regulatory matter
Send a brief outline of the concern, identify the regulator or professional body involved and state any response, hearing or appeal deadline. Explain whether another legal adviser is already involved. RWS will consider whether it can assist and what an appropriate first piece of work would involve.