‘Responding to the publication of the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill, Alistair MacDonald QC, Chairman of the Bar, said: “The ‘double lock’ requirement of needing both judicial and senior ministerial authorisation for the most intrusive investigatory powers is not as secure as it is made out to be.” ‘
The Bar Council, 5th November 2015
Source: www.barcouncil.org.uk
‘The statutory protection of legally privileged communications between lawyers and their clients should be high on the agenda when Parliament debates major new surveillance legislation next month. The Bar Council and The Law Society have called for legal professional privilege to receive statutory protection in the forthcoming Investigatory Powers Bill.’
The Bar Council, 22nd October 2015
Source: www.barcouncil.org.uk
‘It is common practice for an unscrupulous claimant, to run a doubtful personal injury claim to the door of the court, hoping to force a settlement, and then, at the last minute, to discontinue, in order to avoid the risk of failure, a finding of fundamental dishonesty and a costs liability.’
Park Square Barrister, 18th September 2015
Source: www.parksquarebarristers.co.uk
‘Prisoners’ confidential legal letters to and from their lawyers and the courts have been wrongly opened by prison staff in half of cases investigated by the prisons ombudsman in the past year.’
The Guardian, 29th September 2015
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘An intriguing summary has emerged on Lawtel (subscription required) of a decision of the Chancery Division (John Jarvis QC) in a case called Hallows v Wilson Barca LLP, which suggests that the duties imposed on public bodies by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) can be relevant to the common law doctrine of legal professional privilege.’
OUT-LAW.com, 14th September 2015
Source: www.out-law.com
‘FOCUS: Businesses that experience data security breaches can use the law of legal privilege to investigate the circumstances of those breaches without fear that internal investigation documents will be used against them by regulators or litigants.’
OUT-LAW.com, 26th August 2015
Source: www.out-law.com
‘The Information Commissioner’s Code of Practice on Data Protection steadfastly maintains that data controllers cannot refuse to respond to a subject access request unless one of the specific exceptions in the Data Protection Act 1998 (“DPA”) applies. However, there is a growing body of case law on the circumstances in which the courts will refuse to enforce compliance with subject access requests under s 7(9) of the Act, even where one of the specific exceptions under the Act does not apply.’
Panopticon, 12th August 2015
Source: www.panopticonblog.com
Dawson-Damer and others v Taylor Wessing LLP and others [2015] EWHC 2366 (Ch); [2015] WLR (D) 361
‘The purpose of section 7 of the Data Protection Act 1998 entitling an individual to have access to information in the form of his “personal data” was to enable him to check whether the data controller’s processing of it unlawfully infringed his privacy and, if so, to take such steps as the Act provided, to protect it. It was no part of its purpose to enable the individual to obtain discovery of documents that might assist him in litigation or complaints against third parties.’
WLR Daily, 6th August 2015
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
‘Legal professional privilege can be qualified in the “rare circumstances” where it is necessary to impose a requirement that other people are present at discussions between lawyers and clients, the Court of Appeal has ruled.’
Legal Futures, 10th August 2015
Source: www.legalfutures.co.uk
Regina v Brown (Edward) [2015] EWCA Crim 1328; [2015] WLR (D) 344
‘By way of an additional common law qualification or exception to the inviolable nature of legal professional privilege, and in what was likely to be an extremely narrow band of cases, it was appropriate to impose a requirement that particular individuals could be present at discussions between an individual and his lawyers if there was a real possibility that the meeting would be misused for a purpose, or in a manner, that involved impropriety amounting to an abuse of the privilege that justified interference.’
WLR Daily, 29th July 2015
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
‘The First-Tier Tribunal has dismissed an appeal and held that following a freedom of information request Aylesbury Vale District Council was entitled to refuse disclosure of correspondence between its solicitor and the planning department.’
OUT-LAW.com, 9th July 2015
Source: www.out-law.com
‘The First-Tier Tribunal has ruled that a district council was entitled to refuse to disclose correspondence passing between one of its solicitors and various members of its planning department.’
Full story
Local Government Lawyer, 30th June 2015
Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk
‘When does a contractual retainer arise & when does legal advice privilege apply, asks David Burrows.’
New Law Journal, 24th April 2015
Source: www.newlawjournal.co.uk
‘GCHQ, Britain’s national security surveillance agency, has been ordered to destroy legally privileged communications it unlawfully collected from a Libyan rendition victim.’
The Guardian, 29th April 2015
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
Birdseye and another v Roythorne & Co and others [2015] EWHC 1003 (Ch); [2015] WLR (D) 169
‘It remained the case that a person had to establish as a prima facie case that he was a beneficiary before there could be any question of the court requiring a trustee or executor to disclose documents which would be protected by privilege if the applicant were not a beneficiary.’
WLR Daily, 15th April 2015
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
‘The High Court has rejected an application to strike out part of a negligence claim on the grounds that they referred to matters protected by legal professional privilege.’
Litigation Futures, 16th April 2015
Source: www.litigationfutures.com
‘Samuel Littlejohns, pupil at 1 Hare Court, examines whether the very fact that a party consulted a lawyer at a given time is privileged information, and the practical consequences of this for practitioners.’
Family Law Week, 27th March 2015
Source: www.familylawweek.co.uk
‘The government has refused to give an undertaking not to take advantage of any intercepted communications between a former detainee, who is suing the Ministry of Defence, and his lawyers.’
The Guardian, 30th March 2015
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘This paper covers key information rights cases in 2014. The breadth of issues covered below, from legal professional privilege, human rights to vexatious requests, demonstrates the overlap between information law and many other areas of public law. This paper is intended to provide guidance, even for those who are not steeped, day-to-day, in the workings of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOIA”) and the Data Protection Act 1998 (the “DPA”), on the practical implications of these developments.’
Full story (PDF)
Thirty Nine Essex Street, February 2015
Source: www.39essex.com
‘Overriding lawyer-client & confidential communications is incompatible with the rule of law, as Nicholas Griffin QC, Robert O’Sullivan QC & Gordon Nardell QC explain.’
New Law Journal, 27th February 2015
Source: www.newlawjournal.co.uk
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