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ARTICLE · 15 SEPTEMBER 2020

Disclosing Party To Determine Privilege

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As part of a regulatory investigation, the FRC issued a statutory notice requiring an auditor, which was the subject of the investigation, to produce papers, including those regarding its client's business.

United KingdomEmployment and HR
Beth Brown
Beth Brown
Richard Evans
Richard Evans
Stuart Pickford
Stuart Pickford
Tom Wild
Tom Wild
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In the recent case of A v B and the Financial Reporting Council 1 ("FRC") the Court considered the difficulty facing a regulated body when dealing with a statutory request to produce documents which a third party asserts (or may assert) are privileged.

Background

As part of a regulatory investigation, the FRC issued a statutory notice requiring an auditor, which was the subject of the investigation, to produce papers, including those regarding its client's business. The legislation makes it clear that the obligation to provide documents in response to a statutory notice does not arise where the person served with the notice would be entitled to refuse to produce those documents in the High Court on the grounds of legal professional privilege. Broadly, this type of privilege applies to documents created for the purpose of giving confidential legal advice and to documents created for the purpose of actual or anticipated litigation. There is a similar exception to

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