Law firm conflict rules

[Novoiceleft]

Dear All

Am interested in you interpretation of the following scenario.

Mr C hires Partner A in law firm ABC to act on his divorce from Mrs F. During the late stages of the divorce matter, law firm ABC suggests that Mr C should contact a different Partner (Partner B), a colleague of Partner A in the same Department of firm ABC. At that point, Mr C recognises the name of Partner B and realises that Partner B acted for Mrs F in the divorce of her first marriage. At that time, Partner B was with a different firm - not firm ABC. Mr C declines to contact Partner B "for reasons of Conflict".

Is firm ABC conflicted ? Should they not initially have taken on Mr C's matter - or at least informed him of the conflict situation around Partner B ?

This is a real scenario - would be interested in your views

Many thanks

NoVoice

[Dod101]

I think we need to assume that there is no conflict of interest, at least as far as the Law Society rules are concerned, although our resident CK would be able clarify that I guess. After all, Partner B may not even know about the case that Partner A is handling and Partner A may not know that in a previous firm, Partner B acted for Mrs F. However if I were Mr C I would certainly ask Partner A why at this stage does he want to hand the case over to Partner B and does he realise that Partner B acted for Mrs F in her earlier divorce?

However in the absence of any contrary evidence I would assume that all partners are acting in a proper and professional manner.

Purely my own personal opinion.

Dod

[Clitheroekid]

Mr C hires Partner A in law firm ABC to act on his divorce from Mrs F. During the late stages of the divorce matter, law firm ABC suggests that Mr C should contact a different Partner (Partner B), a colleague of Partner A in the same Department of firm ABC. At that point, Mr C recognises the name of Partner B and realises that Partner B acted for Mrs F in the divorce of her first marriage. At that time, Partner B was with a different firm - not firm ABC. Mr C declines to contact Partner B "for reasons of Conflict".

Is firm ABC conflicted ? Should they not initially have taken on Mr C's matter - or at least informed him of the conflict situation around Partner B ?

I can't see that there's any automatic conflict in this situation, though I can understand that Mr C might not be comfortable about Mr F acting.

The SRA guidance is set out here - https://www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/guida ... -interest/

But it specifically states:

You should not act in a matter where you have a conflict of interest or a significant risk of one, subject to certain specified exceptions (paragraph 6.2 of the Codes). The same applies to parts of a matter; particular tasks or "aspects" of it.

A conflict of interest means a situation where your separate duties to act in the best interests of two or more clients in the same or a related matter conflict.

For this situation to happen, you must be currently acting, or intending to, act for two or more clients. For example, you would not be prohibited from acting for a client even if you previously acted against them in family proceedings on behalf of their former partner.

Although every firm carries out a conflict check when taking on a new client this can't reveal every possible conflict. In this scenario there's no way that a conflict check would have revealed that Mr F had acted for Mrs C, as her name wouldn't appear in the firm's list of clients.