Earlier this week, ACSO responded to the Legal Services Board (LSB) consultation on draft guidance on promoting technology and innovation to improve access to legal services. The LSB has outlined how the regulators it oversees should pursue its three outcomes on this topic.
ACSO supports the proposed outcome approach by the LSB given the LSB is an oversight regulator. It appears to provide a balance of uniformity and flexibility. Uniformity will benefit the regulators as it will ensure their guidance will cover similar topics. This will minimise confusion and will also ensure that the regulators broadly pull in the same direction. Furthermore, the flexibility the outcome approach provides will ensure that the regulators can adapt their guidance and anticipate issues.
The first LSB outcome is that ‘technology and innovation are used to support improved access to legal services and to address unmet need.’ ACSO strongly supports this because as the LSB itself notes, it ‘is focussed on consumers.’ Furthermore, we support the LSB position within this outcome that there should be an increased focus on developing LawTech which targets improving vulnerable groups’ access to justice.
However, regulators should continue to ensure traditional methods are retained to some extent. This will maintain access to legal services for those who do not have access to technology or simply do not embrace it.
The second outcome was that ‘regulation balances the benefits and risks, and the opportunities and costs, of technology and innovation in the interests of the public and consumers.’ Risks will need to be taken when developing LawTech, but that is acceptable when the balance favours consumers.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is an appropriate example. There are concerns and misconceptions around AI, so consumer confidence in AI products is low. So we welcome the LSB’s commitment to ensuring that there is transparency around the use of AI, believing it should be introduced carefully and when the associated risks can also be shown to be small.
The third outcome was that ‘the legal services sector is open to technology providers and innovators and barriers to entry are lowered’. Barriers do need to be lower, but guidance should ensure that LawTech products do not flood the market and to vulnerable customers do not suffer inadvertent detriment.
It’s encouraging that many of the LSB’s proposals are in line with actions that we set out in ACSO’s 2021 Technology and Innovation Report. However, the draft LSB guidance needs to more explicit.