Lawyers, advocates and consultants

This page represents a personal opinion and no responsibility can be accepted.

Need a solicitor or a barrister?

Since the UK National Workplace Bullying Advice Line was founded in January 1996, one of the most commonly-asked questions is "where can I find a good solicitor / barrister / attorney?" Experience has shown that whilst there are some good legal people around, many Advice Line callers or visitors to Bully OnLine have had their difficulties compounded - and sometimes sabotaged - by a negligent or collusive legal representative.

There are many reasons why it's hard to make progress legally in a case of bullying. These include:

• weak law - there's no law specifically on bullying
• tribunals can only make judgements on the law as it exists - if they were to do otherwise their judgement would be overturned on appeal
• cases are long and complex - the bully adds spin and distortion at every interaction and after a year or two they become impossible to unpick
• solicitors and barristers are bound by their professional codes of conduct and won't dig the dirt on the serial bully - which is what you need to do to get a settlement in this type of case
• there's "no evidence", at least not of any physical nature - but remember that your journal reveals the patterns of behaviour which reveal intent and constitute the evidence you need
• the serial bully is an accomplished liar with a Jekyll and Hyde nature who uses charm, mimicry and regurgitation
• the serial bully excels at deception
• the serial bully is skilled at stimulating adversarial interaction and destructive conflict between the employer and the employee
• everyone is in denial
• the bully has deceived HR and management who are now firmly behind the bully - but not with a knife poised, unfortunately
• if an employer realises they've got a bully, they're unlikely to admit this because it potentially opens the way to legal action by all the bully's previous targets
• you can't get witnesses because the bully has threatened everyone off
• very few people have the moral courage to stand up and be a witness for you - they've got jobs, responsibilities, mortgage, etc
• you quickly find out how many true friends you have at work - not many
• whilst some unions support their members in bullying cases, many unions do not, and some are obstructive; it also depends on the local rep - if s/he is part of the management team you'll find it difficult, sometimes impossible, to get the case started; sometimes the local rep does not have support from higher up the union (see list of unions most commonly reported as refusing to support their member at workbully/public.htm)
• the injury you suffer is psychiatric, not physical, and the medical profession is not good at recognising and understanding psychiatric injury - there's very little in the medical textbooks at present
• the defence may pay a less-than-ethical psychiatrist to produce a report dismissing and denying your psychiatric injury
• very few people have the knowledge, insight and experience to understand bullying
• very few legal people have the experience of prosecuting a bullying case
• compensation for constructive dismissal etc is so low that in the unlikely event of you getting this far it probably won't cover the legal bill
• some legal professionals lack the diligence, perseverance etc to handle bullying cases
• sometimes there is collusion between your legal representative and the employer - especially if they belong to the same club or fraternal organisation
• the barrister will often say that in his opinion, there is a less-than-50% chance of winning, therefore s/he won't take the case - thus the lack of case law becomes self-perpetuating
• most of the successful cases that do include personal injury are sometimes settled immediately prior to the hearing and thus do not become case law

Successful cases and good lawyers

Long v. Mercury Mobile Communications Services

Howell v. Newport County Borough Council

Consultants, advocates, and lawyers

With the law weak in the area of bullying, and legally-qualified people sometimes reluctant to take these cases on, there are opportunities for "consultants", "advocates" and "lawyers" to fulfil the need for legal representation. Experience has shown that some of these can be incompetent, some can be negligent, and some can be fraudulent.

As a rule, check the individual's qualifications, membership of professional bodies, and especially track record. If you have any doubts, resist their tempting offers of representation. Their actions, and inactions, may ultimately cause you greater detriment than the original bullying.

For example, one former target (allegedly) of bullying set themself up as a consultant specialising in handling bullying cases for a particular profession. Although professing to offer free support, any target who showed interest was asked for money and the free support never materialised. At tribunal, the consultant was ill-prepared, knew less than they claimed, and usually lost the case or won only a very small settlement, often less than their bill. Clients who refused to pay the consultant's bill citing negligence were then sued by the consultant.

In another case, an advocate asked for increasingly large sums of money, often encouraging the target to take out large bank loans whilst promising the earth but did little work on the case. The advocate was hopeless in court and when the clients - at least six that I know of - refused to pay the bill, the advocate used a debt collection company to threaten and harass the target. One client managed to get a court order for repayment but it is unclear whether the order was served as it proved difficult finding out where this advocate lived.

In yet another case, an individual called himself a "lawyer" but provided no evidence of any legal qualifications, no membership of any professional body, and no experience of case work. He appeared to use a tenuous association with a legal professional to suggest that he, too, was a legal professional. Not so, though. His advice, although offered "free", was often misleading, and sometimes wrong.

In the UK, the question of unqualified or unaffiliated individuals offering legal services was recently examined by The Blackwell Committee at the behest Lord Irvine, the Lord Chancellor - effectively the boss of judges in the UK. The report, "The investigation of non-legally qualified claims: assessors and advisers who act for reward", observed:

144. The Committee did, however, note with come concern the lack of legal constraint in the UK designed to prevent advisers assuming titles which could mislead the public (either by act or omission) into believing that a non-legally qualified adviser was a member of one of the prescribed legal professions*. Descriptions brought to the attention of the Committee include, amongst others, "legal consultant", "qualified lawyer", "specialist advocate", "law attorney". We considered that this was an important issue which, from the consumer's perspective, would benefit from being reviewed. It could be that non-legally qualified advisers should be obliged to state on advertising literature, documentation and correspondence that they were not a qualified solicitor, barrister or legal executive normally employed in a solicitor's firm.

* Note Section 21 of the Solicitors Act 1974: "Any unqualified person who wilfully pretends to be, or takes or issues any name, title, addition or description implying that he is, qualified or recognised by law as qualified to act as a solicitor shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding the fourth level on the standard scale."

Links

Scotland Against Crooked Lawyers - http://www.sacl.info

General advice on action to tackle bullying is at action/index.htm

Preparing for an employment tribunal (not referenced at Bully OnLine): action/tribunal.htm

Phrases and strategies for employees to tackle bullying (not referenced at Bully OnLine): action/words.htm

Phrases and strategies for employers to tackle bullying: action/empwords.htm

Winning your disability case: action/disability.htm

Time limits for bringing a personal injury case: action/timelim.htm

Gagging clauses (not referenced at Bully OnLine): action/gagclaus.htm

Dealing with a bad reference: action/referenc.htm

Tim Field
Webmaster, Bully OnLine at www.bullyonline.org
Moderator, BullyOnline action forum
Author, Bully in sight: how to predict, resist, challenge and combat workplace bullying
May 2005