Simon Langford

Introduction

Simon Langford is a former English solicitor who was struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal in 2026 after misleading a conveyancing client for years about the status of her property registration. Admitted in 1979, he was a solicitor of almost 50 years’ standing when the tribunal ended his career. Langford was the owner, manager and sole solicitor at Sayers Solicitors, a Harrow firm specialising in conveyancing, and he also held the roles of compliance officer and money laundering reporting officer. The tribunal heard that Langford admitted all the allegations made against him, including dishonestly providing false information to the client about the registration of her property.

Background Information

Langford was admitted as a solicitor in 1979 and spent his career in small high street practice. Sayers Solicitors, based in Harrow, specialised in conveyancing — the legal work of buying, selling and registering property — and Langford ran it alone in every sense that mattered: he was its owner, its manager and its only solicitor, while also serving as the firm’s compliance officer and money laundering reporting officer. In 2017 Langford’s business partner died unexpectedly, and according to the mitigation later put before the tribunal he had been under considerable pressure ever since as he tried to keep the firm going alone.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Adjudicated. The findings in this section come from the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal, the body that disciplines solicitors in England and Wales. Langford admitted all the allegations against him, including dishonestly providing false information to a client, and the strike-off is a regulatory outcome of that tribunal — a professional sanction, not a criminal conviction. No criminal proceedings were reported.

The core of the case began ordinarily enough. In 2019 Langford was instructed on a house purchase which included registering the purchase with HM Land Registry, the department that records ownership of land in England and Wales. The original application made by the firm was rejected in 2019 — and it was never refiled. The client noticed a year after completion that the property was not appearing on sold-property price websites and raised a concern. From that point, on as many as seven occasions over the next three years, Langford gave assurances about the status of the registration, saying that the application was “back in” and then “lodged” when in fact nothing further had been filed. The client finally learnt the truth from the Land Registry itself in 2023, which confirmed that no further application had been filed since the original 2019 rejection. She referred Langford to the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

A second matter followed a similar pattern. Langford’s firm had undertaken to submit an application to register a lease extension within three days of a completion. Instead, the lawyers for the purchasers emailed 26 times and rang a further 22 times over nine months, and Langford continued not to register the lease extension. When the SRA then tried to investigate his conduct, it required numerous attempts to contact him, and the tribunal heard that he repeatedly ignored the regulator. Responding to the SRA, Langford said: “In each case my actions or inactions fell beneath my usual standards and the professional standards which could have been expected of me… I deeply regret my actions/inactions which have led to these complaints.”

Before the tribunal, Langford admitted everything, including the most serious allegation — that he had dishonestly provided false information to the client about the registration of her property. In mitigation, he explained that his business partner had died unexpectedly in 2017 and that he had been under considerable pressure since then as he tried to keep the firm going. He would have wished to leave the profession without this stain upon his character, but he had got himself into difficulties from which he had been unable to extricate himself.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The consequences were professional and severe rather than the product of a public campaign. The tribunal said the harm caused to the reputation of the profession was high and described the misconduct as deliberate, calculated and repeated. Langford was struck off — removed from the roll of solicitors — and ordered to pay £45,630 in costs. The sanction also reached the firm itself: the SRA intervened into Sayers Solicitors following the hearing, an arrangement in which the regulator takes control of a practice that can no longer be trusted to run itself. The case was reported by the Law Gazette, the Law Society’s publication, under a headline about a veteran solicitor struck off after misleading a client for years. The reporting recorded no public statement in Langford’s defence and no organised public reaction.

Current Status

As of the Law Gazette’s report on 7 August 2026, Langford has been struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal and ordered to pay £45,630 in costs. The hearing took place the previous month, and the SRA intervened into his Harrow firm following it. Because Langford admitted all the allegations, including dishonesty, there was no contested finding, and the reporting records no appeal against the tribunal’s decision. Having been struck off, he is removed from the roll and may no longer practise as a solicitor, and the intervention leaves Sayers Solicitors under the regulator’s control.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The strike-off ended a legal career of almost fifty years at a single stroke. Langford had been admitted in 1979 and had spent his professional life in conveyancing, rising to own and solely run the firm whose failures the tribunal judged. His own framing to the tribunal was strikingly resigned: he said that an end to the constant stress of running a small high street practice “would in truth be a blessing”. Yet the same mitigation conceded what the outcome cost him — the wish to leave the profession without this stain upon his character, and the acknowledgement that he had got himself into difficulties from which he had been unable to extricate himself. The consequences extended beyond him: the firm he had kept going alone after his business partner’s death in 2017 was taken over by the regulator, and the £45,630 costs order added a financial reckoning to the professional one. The case stands as a study in how a single unfiled registration — a rejected 2019 application that was never resubmitted — compounded, through years of telling a client that the application was “back in” and “lodged”, into admitted dishonesty and the end of a long career.

Sources

• Law Gazette, “Veteran solicitor struck off after misleading client for years,” Aug 7, 2026 — source