Davies vs Greene: An analysis

As a follow up to my piece in the Times, you can register and get a free read I think, I set out the longer piece I prepared whilst thinking this case through. There is of course no substitute for reading the case in full if you can to make up your own mind about …

Ongoing competence: BS or 5750?

To those of you who get the reference in the title. Congratulations. You have come a long way. For the rest, BS5750 was a quality assurance system, all the rage in the 1990s, which came to mind, alongside legal aid practice management standards, and other joys, as I read the LSB's 'Ongoing Competence' report. This …

Lawyers for the Post Office Machine

The Criminal Cases Review Commission published its submission to the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry. For those of you unaware, in broad brush terms, this Inquiry relates to the prosecution of large numbers of sub-postmasters for failures which the defendants say arose out of the flawed Horizon accounts system run by the Post Office. The …

Hong Kong Questions

David Perry QC’s decision to act in the Hong Kong prosecution of nine defendants on two charges of unauthorized assembly has come in for a great deal of criticism. This includes the current (Conservative) Foreign Secretary, a former (Labour) Lord Chancellor, and other legal luminaries, politicians and lawyers. The press reports, and comments garnered from …

NDA, Redacted

The multiple ironies of what happened here, early in the Covid-crisis, will not be lost on many. The SDT have stayed the SRA's prosecution of Mark Mansell for professional misconduct. The case arises out of the NDAs negotiated for Harvey Weinstein against Zelda Perkins and Rowena Chiu. The saga ends, if it has ended, where …

In honour of Deborah Rhode

Steven and I have been moved by the untimely death of Professor Deborah Rhode. Deborah was one of the giants of legal ethics. She has shown great personal kindness to many legal ethics scholars, and written many great works. As it happens last week we were finalising a chapter on leading works on ethics for …

On deliberate contempt as professional martyrdom

A personal Statement from 'barrister' and director of plan.b earth (published yesterday) Tim Crosland has caused a stir, because of an apparently deliberate and pre-meditated breaching of a Supreme Court embargo on its decision on Heathrow’s Third Runway (published today). It began like this: Tomorrow, 16 December, the Supreme Court will publish its judgement on …

Beckwith 2: the SDT’s card should be marked

A quick post from me, based on my tweets yesterday, on the overturning of the SDT decision in the Beckwith case. I blogged about the original decision here. This is what I said of note: The SDT is not as clear as we might hope about what is the behaviour that is being criticised here …

Is Law Tech augmented lawyering?

John Armour, Richard Parnham and Mari Sako have put up an interesting paper on ‘Augmented Lawyering’. The central aim is to consider what impact artificial intelligence and “associated digital technology” will have on the work of lawyers and the structure of law firms. It is an empirical study based on 52 interviews and a survey …

Integrity, independence, and culture: not a Russian problem, a professional problem

The Navigator Equities v Deripaska [2020] EWHC 1798 (Comm) provides an interesting account of a troubling case. It raises questions about the conduct of the case by a Clifford Chance partner. It left me wondering if the SRA needs to conduct a thematic review of the area. And whilst it is tempting to ask again …