Fined £50k in 2023
A senior solicitor who was fined £50,000 for attempting to restrict a tax lawyer from publishing a legal email on behalf of former Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi is appealing the ruling in the High Court.
Ashley Hurst, a partner and head of client strategy at Osborne Clarke, was found by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) in December 2023 to have committed professional misconduct. The tribunal concluded that an email sent by Hurst to tax campaigner and former Clifford Chance partner Dan Neidle was improperly labelled as “confidential and without prejudice”, in what it described as an attempt to deter Neidle from publishing its contents.
Neidle had recently published commentary on his Tax Policy Associates blog accusing Zahawi of lying about his tax affairs — an allegation that later contributed to Zahawi’s political downfall. The email from Hurst arrived the same day, stating that Neidle was not entitled to publish or refer to it, except for the purposes of obtaining legal advice.
The tribunal found that Hurst had used the without prejudice label not as part of a genuine attempt to negotiate or resolve the matter, but as a means to suppress publication — a move the tribunal said demonstrated a lack of integrity and a failure to uphold his regulatory responsibilities. While the case drew widespread attention due to concerns around SLAPPs (strategic lawsuits against public participation), the tribunal was clear that the matter should not be classified as such.
Neidle has since published both the SDT’s ruling and Hurst’s appeal documents. In his appeal, now lodged with the High Court’s Administrative Court, Hurst claims the tribunal’s findings were “irrational and unsustainable”, arguing that his email did contain a genuine offer of settlement and that he had acted in accordance with professional norms.
He further submits that the tribunal ignored substantial written and oral evidence relating to his intent and failed to make any express finding as to whether the email was genuinely covered by without prejudice protection. Hurst also argues that the tribunal’s determination that he had no intention of engaging in settlement discussions is contradicted by its own findings, including its acceptance that “what he was trying to do was get Mr Neidle on the telephone”.
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), which brought the case, is resisting the appeal. It maintains that the tribunal’s ruling was correct.
Hurst, who reportedly spent nearly £910,000 defending himself during the SDT proceedings, was also ordered to pay £260,000 in SRA costs.
Commenting on the appeal, Neidle wrote: “If Mr Hurst wins this appeal, then solicitors will have a green light to claim their libel threats cannot be published, or even referred to. The ‘secret SLAPP’ will have become blessed by the courts. That would be a terrible result for everybody who cares about free speech.”
Osborne Clarke has so far declined to comment on the matter.
Zahawi was sacked from his cabinet roles in January 2023 after it emerged he had paid almost £5 million to HMRC to settle his tax affairs while serving as Chancellor, without disclosing the investigation — a breach of the Ministerial Code.
