Attorney General’s Office: Conflicts of Interest

Debate between Lucy Rigby and Tony Vaughan

Thursday 23rd January 2025 Commons Chamber

[The Solicitor General]

As I have already stated, the Law Officers’ convention does not permit me to reveal when the Attorney General has been asked for advice or when he has advised.

[Tony Vaughan (Folkestone and Hythe) (Lab)]

I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests as a member of the Bar.

It seems that Conservative Members are deliberately feigning ignorance about our constitution to make an empty political point. The truth is that lawyers in this country represent clients without fear or favour. We do not in this country associate the views of our clients or the clients with the views of their lawyers, and there is the concept of the cab rank rule. Does the Solicitor General agree with me that the Law Officers’ convention and existing processes, which, as she says, have been in place for many years under successive Governments, can be left to regulate conflicts of interest, as they always have done? If the Conservatives genuinely had a problem with that, they would have changed it when they were in government.

[The Solicitor General]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I am grateful to him for making that point. As I said earlier, barristers are quite simply not their clients, and I have quoted the words of the current Conservative shadow Attorney General.