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An advocacy group has challenged the NSW Law Society to provide greater scrutiny of its Lawcover arrangements, including how premiums are set, capital is managed, and potential conflicts of interest are addressed.
Ahead of its annual general meeting (AGM) next week, the Law Society of NSW was asked to justify Lawcover’s monopoly over professional indemnity insurance (PII), which has been a sore point for small-to-medium practices in recent months.
Practitioners behind advocacy group Solicitors for PII Choice have told Lawyers Weekly they have no “practical flexibility”, and are most concerned with the fact that Lawcover is a wholly owned but independent subsidiary of the Law Society.
Solicitors for PII Choice advocate and Augmena principal Angelique Nesbitt questioned what, if any, governance arrangements the Law Society has in place to “identify and manage actual, potential or perceived conflicts”.
The Law Society was also asked to respond to data in its 2026 annual report, including that as of June, Lawcover held net assets of $179.5 million and regulatory capital of 2.79 times the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s minimum.
Lawcover CEO Kerrie Lalich explained the high sum was to account for “limited access to alternative sources” and the need to ensure it can “continue to meet our financial obligations”.
Nesbitt and her colleagues want to know what Lawcover’s board-approved target capital range is, how it was determined, and what criteria govern the use of capital above the target range for premium relief or other benefits to insured practices.
The annual report also stated Lawcover’s premium rates per dollar of gross fee income fell by more than 40 per cent over 15 years, while industry-wide rates have risen by over 15 per cent. Solicitors for PII Choice want to see the evidence behind this.
Responding to Lawcover’s own allocation of about $11 million over two years to help reduce insurance premiums, Nesbitt has asked the Law Society just how much that has saved practitioners and whether the savings can continue.
Finally, having regard to “governance, capital management and premium matters” addressed in the annual report, the Law Society has been asked whether it would consider an independently governed review of the current arrangements.
“If not, what process does the Council consider appropriate to support informed member discussion of the current arrangements and possible alternatives?” Nesbitt said.
The effect of Lawcover’s monopoly over the NSW legal profession will also be scrutinised before a parliamentary inquiry headed up by independent MP Taylor Martin.
The inquiry will “provide an important opportunity to examine whether the current arrangements continue to deliver the best outcomes for solicitors, consumers and the broader community”, a spokesperson with Solicitors for PII Choice said.
For now, Nesbitt has asked members of the Law Society to attend the AGM “and show that transparency, meaningful consultation and genuine consideration of choice matter to the profession”.
“A strong member turnout will send a clear message: the profession is engaged, interest[ed] and paying attention.”
How members are able to engage with the AGM has also become an issue, with Jake McKinley principal Jacob Carswell-Doherty and The Collective Law Co principal Anne Taylor complaining that it will be held in-person only “without reason”.
In a letter to Law Society president Ronan MacSweeney and general counsel and company secretary Meaghan Lewis, Carswell-Doherty and Taylor said it “does not fit a body that calls itself the representative voice of every solicitor in the state”.
They pointed out that 52 per cent of NSW solicitors practise in suburban Sydney, rural NSW, interstate, or overseas.
“For a suburban sole practitioner, a weekday afternoon in Philip Street is a closed office. For a rural member it is a flight and a night away. For Taylor it is two hours each way, a babysitter and a day of lost work,” Carswell-Doherty and Taylor said.
They have asked the Law Society to make accommodations for members to appear online. If not, to confirm whether the meeting will be adjourned, identify why it will proceed in-person only, and confirm the location of future AGMs.
