Legal Research

Update on Work of CBA Task Force on Conflicts

By Dan Pinnington

The CBA Task Force continues to work to help the profession with conflicts issues.

On top of the original report and the amended model code of conduct, there is the excellent collection of precedent documents and checklists in the CBA Conflicts Task Force Toolkit. A full list of the documents in the toolkit is here. I am a member of the Task Force did a lot of work on the Toolkit. I think it is truly a fantastic collection of resources that can help lawyers avoid conflicts of interest claims.

There is also an overview and list of recent cases on conflicts of interest matters.

The Task Force is now working on a universal annotated engagement letter. This engagement letter precedent will be adaptable for use in a wide range of areas of law and types of practice. The goal is to provide practitioners with a template that they can easily customize for every client.

To help us prepare an engagement letter that is truly useful and helpful for all lawyers, CBA has just sent its members a survey of how and where they use retainers and engagements letters, and in what circumstances they are not used. If you are a CBA member, please complete the survey as your feedback will help us with this work.

If you would like a direct email notice when the CBA model engagement letter is released, please provide your email address here.

Cross posted on Avoid a Claim

Full post as published by Slaw.ca on April 29, 2010 (boomark / email).