The Law Society will seek to intervene to prevent legal professional privilege (LPP) being extended to accountants if the matter comes before the Supreme Court, Chancery Lane said last week.

Financial services company Prudential was granted leave to appeal a previous Court of Appeal decision that LPP can only apply to solicitors and barristers.

If Prudential chooses to go ahead with the appeal, the Supreme Court may award LPP to accountants and other professional advisers.

Prudential and the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW), which intervened in the Court of Appeal case last October, argued that there should be no distinction between a lawyer and a chartered accountant giving advice on tax law.

However, the appeal court ruled that extending LPP was a matter for parliament, not the courts, and that LPP should continue to apply only to lawyers until parliament decided otherwise.

Law Society president Linda Lee said: ‘LPP is a fundamental right, long established in common law.

'The Society will intervene to ensure the scope of LPP remains clear and certain, so that it remains an important safeguard for clients who seek and obtain legal advice.’

However Ian Young, ICAEW Tax Faculty technical manager, said LPP should be extended. He said: ‘Accountants don’t have a duty to the courts, but we do have a public interest duty.’

Young added that the Legal Services Act would make legal advice more widely available, as lawyers and accountants work together in alternative business structures.

‘Provided we are giving legal advice with significant safeguards, then clients should be as free to come to us as to lawyers,’ he said.

A Prudential spokesman said it was ‘considering its options’ in relation to the appeal.