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28 February 2025 / John Gould
Issue: 8106 / Categories: Opinion , Rule of law , Profession , Legal services
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The Attorney General: under attack?

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Condemning an Attorney General based on their past client list shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the rule of law, writes John Gould

An exchange between Sir Ashley Fox and the Attorney General (AG), Lord Hermer, at the Commons Justice Select Committee in January seems to have been the start of a period of remorseless newspaper speculation as to how Lord Hermer might be misconducting himself by having unsound beliefs or perhaps by ignoring ‘conflicts of interest’. Sir Ashley had spotted that the AG had previously represented former Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams in defending a claim for damages by provisional IRA bomb victims. This, and other cases, might be presented to the uninformed as something which made a lawyer unfit to hold the office of AG. In fact, the opposite is true.

A link was suggested to the government’s recent confirmation that it would be changing the law in a way which might benefit a class of people which possibly included Mr Adams. The decision followed a specific finding

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