The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has told a former legal consultant he should not return to the profession, seven years after he was first excluded. Huseyin Arslan had applied to the tribunal for a review of the decision to impose a section 43 order against him, which effectively bars him from working for any regulated practice.

But following opposition from the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the tribunal rejected Arslan’s many arguments in favour of a review. It was decided that the section 43 order had not been a breach of his human rights and his points lacked merit.

The case had a long history: Arslan had been employed by London firm Duncan Lewis but was suspended in 2014 following an allegation of sexual harassment from a client. He was handed the order after it was found he provided false and misleading information during the course of the SRA’s investigation.

The initial order was made by an SRA adjudicator but was quashed by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal. The SRA lodged a judicial review and successfully applied to the High Court to overturn the tribunal decision, in a judgment still cited by the regulator when it appeals tribunal decisions.

Arslan applied last October to revoke the section 43 order, after approaching the SRA for advice on how he should proceed.

The regulator wrongly advised that he would need to make his revocation application to the tribunal. The regulator admitted its mistake in a letter to Arslan in March 2022, while stressing that ‘there is no evidence this was done intentionally or recklessly to cause you stress or loss’. The SRA cut the costs it eventually sought from Aslan by almost half to £2,500, as a ‘goodwill gesture’ reflecting its error.

It had in fact been decided following a hearing in January that, while the tribunal had the power to review an SRA order, it could not revoke one. Given an overnight adjournment to decide how to proceed, Arslan made clear he was dissatisfied with the ruling and alleged impropriety, but proceeded with a review of the order.

Arslan had submitted a 39-page skeleton argument running to 212 paragraphs maintaining that the imposition of the order, and the process behind it, was unlawful and a breach of his human rights. He urged the tribunal to ‘leapfrog’ the matter to the Supreme Court (the tribunal said it had no such power and would not have done so even if it had).

Arslan said the section 43 order restricted his employment and he alleged that the SRA had discriminated against him. Describing his as a ‘long and arbitrary investigation’, he stated that the SRA had not given a reason for responding as it did and had acted unreasonably and disproportionately. He said the section 43 order was ‘unclear, ambiguous, meaningless, open to abuse and facilitates discrimination’.

The tribunal rejected all of Arslan’s arguments for a review. Arslan had not been deprived of his rights to a fair process and there was no evidence of impropriety. He was not barred from the profession indefinitely.

The judgment added: ‘Having taken account of any matters which it could properly take into account, the tribunal had found no evidence of a serious procedural or other error in the making of the s43 order.’

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