Essential Q&A guidance for all compliance officers

Conflicts of interest are rarely easy to assess for law firms. It is the classic judgement issue: professional obligations and case law are fact-specific. Any black-and-white conflict issue, the office dog will avoid. But more complex conflict queries require in-depth knowledge of the rules and facts, thinking time, and outstanding recording-keeping to justify withdrawal or continuing, if the perceived conflict does not exist.

This book is written in a question-and-answer format to tackle the practical challenges of conflicts of interest, confidentiality and disclosure for solicitors and compliance officers for legal practice. This layout is incredibly helpful in practice and I have continued to refer to this book when advising client law firms.

The areas covered include the regulatory starting point in respect of overviewing the rules, and dealing with conflicts of interest both in terms of a solicitor and client conflict (known as an ‘own interest’ conflict or a conflict between two clients), confidentiality and duty of disclosure.

The common conflict of interest scenarios are a little basic for my personal preference, though these are the sometimes basic questions asked by my law firm clients. In the next edition, I would like to see more complex examples, an exploration of how confidentiality should be central to conflict analysis, and some additional case law, including SRA and SDT disciplinary cases so that firms can see how the rules are utilised. But this is a minor quibble.

The Risk Management Discussions and Solutions chapter is particularly useful from a COLP’s perspective and probably justifies the purchase price on its own. This book should be available to all COLPs because the issues permeate both contentious and non-contentious work. It is also a very useful additional resource for considering regulatory and ethical duties arising in an area with which the profession has struggled for some years. Given the SRA’s ever-increasing, proactive investigation and fining powers, this is a sensible risk management area to look at.

Paul Bennett is a regulatory specialist solicitor and partner at Bennett Briegal LLP