Advice: trainee assumed responsibility towards employee

Solicitors may owe a duty of care in any advice they give to witnesses giving evidence in a trial - even if the witness is not their own client, according to a ruling by Chesterfield County Court last month.


In what the court thought was the first case of its kind, a trainee at GMH Solicitors advised witness Mark Bailey that he could not be sacked as a result of evidence he gave in the witness box. Mr Bailey testified in an employment tribunal that he had smoked in the workplace - contrary to his employers' policy - in support of the solicitor's client, who had been sacked for smoking. He was dismissed the next day.


Finding for Mr Bailey, the judge accepted his assertion that he would not have given evidence had he not received the assurance that he could not be sacked. The trainee solicitor had taken over the case while a partner was on holiday.


Qamer Ghafoor, an assistant solicitor at Flint Bishop & Barnett in Derby who acted for Mr Bailey, said: 'If, where there is very close proximity between the solicitor and a third party, the third party asks a question and the solicitor decides to answer it, the lawyer should either ensure that the advice given is correct or give a disclaimer, because otherwise there may be an assumption of responsibility and a duty of care owed to the third party.'


Blakemores in Birmingham, which has taken over GMH, had no comment, although it is understood to be considering an appeal.