The Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEX) has announced new leadership, with Eileen Milner appointed chair and Yanthé Richardson named president.

Richardson’s appointment follows a long line of female presidents, in contrast to the Law Society, which currently has an all-male leadership team; 75% of CILEX members are women, while nearly 80% of members attended state schools.

She is currently a principal director at Foot Anstey, specialising in new-build development conveyancing work, having started her career at 17 working in a legal aid firm, first as a secretary, then later as a paralegal before qualifying with CILEX. Before transferring to property law, she practised family law.

Richardson said: “This is a pivotal point in our long history, with achieving equality of opportunity for our members and efficient, effective regulation at the top of the agenda. I will be prioritising support for CILEX lawyers and paralegals in furthering their careers”.

She added: “I want to see more firms like mine without barriers for CILEX lawyers. I want our members to have the potential to go all the way to the top in their organisations if they have the skills and the desire to do so.”

CILEX members – or legal executives – were described by the outgoing chair, professor Chris Bones, as specialist lawyers, as opposed to solicitors who are generalists.

Bones’s successor Milner has a portfolio career, focusing on non-executive appointments in education and skills through her roles as chair of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust and the Children and Families Trust for Bradford and District. She is also chair of the University of Bradford.

She was previously chief executive of the Education and Skills Funding Agency, responsible for skills, apprenticeships and technical education, as well as the regulation of colleges, independent training providers, academies and free schools. Before that, she was chief operating officer at the Care Quality Commission.

She replaces Bones, who leaves after six years in the role where he made equality of opportunity a priority while professionalising education and training, and opening up judicial appointments. He also expanded the range of work CILEX lawyers do, as well as securing funding parity between solicitor and CILEX apprentices.

Milner acknowledged the significant progress CILEX has made under Bones, adding: “I know through my career that we best serve society and our economy when we recognise that talent exists everywhere and at all ages, but historically, opportunity has not always followed.

“At CILEX, we have a proud history of opening up a range of routes into the legal profession by prioritising accessibility and flexibility whilst never compromising on having the highest professional standards and expectations. We are ambitious to do more, and I am confident we are well-equipped to do so collectively.”

The appointments come as legal executives consider transferring regulation from their bespoke regulator, CILEX Regulation, to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) – which the Legal Services Board may review.

CILEX, the Bar Council and the Law Society are all approved regulators under the Legal Services Act. CILEX Regulation, like the SRA, is operationally independent from CILEX. The LSB acts as an oversight regulator and ensures an approved regulator’s work is separate from representative bodies like the Law Society.

The SRA announced in July that it intends to regulate legal executives, stating that it would benefit the public, which the LSB would have to approve. However, CILEX Regulation bitterly opposes the change. One early challenge for CILEX is deciding how to respond to the SRA’s proposals. CILEX’s new leadership will have to navigate a profession divided on the proposals and a Law Society openly opposed to them.

The Law Society’s chief executive, Ian Jeffrey, said in June the SRA should “seriously consider whether the time, resources and management focus required to integrate CILEX regulation into the SRA is wise, given the other priorities the SRA faces in light of the collapse of Axiom Ince”.

Jeffrey acknowledged that Bones’s work had seen CILEX make strides in removing barriers for members. Still, there were issues “where we have respectfully differed”, although he praised Bones’s “constructive and professional dealings”.

Opposition remains, however, as Jeffrey told solicitors earlier this month: “We are deeply concerned that the SRA Board has given the go-ahead to regulating CILEX members, despite its own regulated community, and CILEX’s members objecting to the idea of regulatory change, and the Legal Services Consumer Panel stating that the consumer case has not been made.”

At Richardson’s first board meeting, CILEX decided that regulatory redelegation remained in the public interest, but held off a final decision until October.