The Solicitors Regulation Authority has been ordered to pay almost £15,000 in wasted costs for multiple disclosure failings in a high-profile prosecution.

A coruscating ruling from January, seen by the Gazette, shows the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal made the costs order because of the SRA’s ‘desultory approach’ to disclosure before the Oliver Bretherton hearing earlier this year.

Bretherton, formerly a director with Gowling WLG, is alleged to have abused his position of seniority by sending inappropriate messages to a female colleague. He denies acting without integrity. The hearing has lasted for 10 days so far and is set to resume next month.

Before the substantive hearing, Bretherton’s solicitors sought costs in respect of two case management hearings. They submitted the SRA should have disclosed relevant material without the need for any application when the Bretherton investigation started in 2020. The SRA should have responded within weeks to specific requests for disclosure made last September. The regulator complied in late October then waited another two weeks to contact Bretherton’s former firm.

Bretherton’s solicitors accused the SRA of ‘wholly unreasonable conduct’ in dealing with disclosure requests, including long delays in responses despite repeated chasing. The SRA’s chronology of disclosure requests was ‘incorrect and misleading’ and its conduct of the case ‘a shambles from start to finish’.

The application for costs was ‘firmly resisted’ by the SRA, which denied its conduct was so unreasonable as to justify an order.

The tribunal ruled that the material sought by the respondent was highly relevant and therefore disclosable, and it was ‘abundantly obvious’ that expert reports should have been served. Despite a gap of four months between the disclosure request and the first case management hearing, some material was still outstanding.

The SRA was found to have failed to obtain relevant evidence, failed to review what material should be disclosed, failed to substantively engage in disclosure requests, offered contradictory positions on its attempts to obtain material and caused two extra hearings to be convened to determine outstanding issues.

The application for costs was ‘reasonable and proportionate’ and should be granted.

 

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