Is the Lawyer in a Conflict of Interest?
A lawyer’s duty of loyalty to a client includes a duty to avoid conflicting interests. Divided Loyalties One type of prejudice from which the law of conflict of interest seeks to protect a client is the “prejudice arising where the lawyer ‘soft peddles’ his representation of a client in order to serve his own interests, those of another client, or those of a third person.” Canadian National Railway Co. v. McKercher LLP , 2013 SCC 39, [2013] S.C.R. 649 (“ CNR ”), at para. 23. As regards a current client, a lawyer must not place herself in a situation that jeopardizes her effective on-going representation of the client. CNR , at para. 23. That is because “[t]here should be no room for doubt about counsel’s loyalty and dedication to the client’s case.” R. v. McCallen (1999), 43 O.R. (3d) 56 (C.A.), at p. 67. As well, “[w]hen a client employs an attorney, he has a right to presume, if the latter be silent on the point, that he has no engagements...