Legal Services Board

The Legal Services Board (LSB) is the independent body responsible for overseeing the regulation of lawyers in England and Wales. It is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Ministry of Justice. Its costs are met entirely by a levy on the approved regulators of the legal profession. The LSB is both politically and financially independent of Government. The LSB was created by the Legal Services Act 2007 with a statutory mandate to deliver eight regulatory objectives including ensuring that regulation in the legal services sector is carried out in the public interest; and that the interests of the consumers of legal services are put at the heart of the legal system in England and Wales. The LSB became fully active on 1 January 2010, when the new regulatory regime was activated by statute. The LSB is responsible for appointing the Legal Services Consumer Panel as well as the Office for Legal Complaints, the body responsible for overseeing the Legal Ombudsman scheme.