Ramasamy v Solicitors Regulation Authority

An appellate court will not lightly interfere with a specialist disciplinary tribunal’s factual and evaluative findings, particularly where the tribunal has heard the evidence. A struck-off solicitor may be treated as employed or remunerated even without a contract of employment or financial payment where a firm provides facilities which enable or assist the solicitor to provide legal services under the firm’s apparent auspices. Dishonesty is assessed by applying the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people to the facts as the person understood them; awareness that the conduct was dishonest is not a separate requirement. Where dishonesty is proved, striking off is almost invariably appropriate unless exceptional circumstances exist.

The appellant, a solicitor and sole practitioner, appealed under section 49 of the Solicitors Act 1974 against a decision of the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal. The Tribunal found that she had allowed a struck-off solicitor to use the firm’s facilities, provide legal services, conduct litigation and use a firm email account. It also found that she had dishonestly submitted a bill for attendance at a hearing, and ordered that she be struck off and pay costs.

The appeal challenged the Tribunal’s reasoning, findings concerning remuneration, integrity, dishonesty and supervision, and the proportionality of the sanction. The central issues were whether the facts supported the findings and whether striking off was justified.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Tribunal’s decision was not wrong and was not unjust by reason of serious procedural or other irregularity within Civil Procedure Rules 1998, rule 52.21. The court gave appropriate weight to the Tribunal’s specialist expertise and its advantage in hearing the evidence.
2. “Remuneration” under section 41 of the Solicitors Act 1974 and rule 8.6(c) of the SRA Authorisation Rules 2011 has a wide meaning directed to the mischief addressed by the prohibition. A struck-off solicitor may be remunerated without financial payment where facilities provided by a firm confer a benefit enabling or assisting the provision of legal services under the firm’s apparent auspices. The Tribunal was entitled to find that the provision of accommodation, administrative facilities and access to clients amounted to remuneration. It would also have been entitled to find employment in the wider sense, even without a contract of employment.
3. The Tribunal was entitled to find that the appellant had permitted or allowed the struck-off solicitor to conduct litigation by affording him facilities which allowed a situation to develop in which she lacked control over his activities. Actual knowledge that he attended the hearing was not essential to that conclusion. In context, the Tribunal was also entitled to find failures of integrity, governance, supervision and compliance with the applicable Principles and Outcomes.
4. The Tribunal was entitled to reject the appellant’s explanation that the bill referring to attendance was a genuine mistake. One of two plausible scenarios necessarily applied: either she knew that a struck-off solicitor had attended and billed for that work, or she believed that no one had attended and billed for an attendance which had not occurred. On either basis the submission of the bill was dishonest. The fact that it was unpaid did not alter that conclusion.
5. The Tribunal had applied the former combined Twinsectra approach to dishonesty, which was too favourable to the appellant. The correct approach, explained in Ivey, did not require proof that the person knew that ordinary honest people would regard the conduct as dishonest. The point did not require further action because the appeal failed, but it reinforced the conclusion on dishonesty and would matter if sanction had required reconsideration.
6. The finding of dishonesty, together with the wider governance failures and absence of exceptional circumstances, entitled the Tribunal to order striking off. Personal mitigation and the absence of payment under the bill did not make the sanction disproportionate. The appellant was ordered to pay the Tribunal’s costs of £70,123.30.

• High Court (Administrative Court) — In [2018] EWHC 117 (Admin), the Divisional Court dismissed the appeal under section 49 of the Solicitors Act 1974 and upheld the order striking the appellant off the Roll and requiring payment of costs.
• Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal — The Tribunal’s judgment dated 21 July 2017 found a number of allegations proved, including dishonest submission of a bill, ordered that the appellant be struck off and assessed costs at £70,123.30.