The Accidental Consistency: Extracting a Coherent Principle from the Jurisprudence Surrounding Solicitor Client Privilege between the Police and the Crown

The development of a clear and consistent approach to solicitor client privilege between the police and the Crown has met with significant difficulty. The author client argues, however, that despite a lack of apparent clarity in both jurisprudence and legislation, a closer examination reveals that a type of "accidental consistency" has developed, whereby the police can maintain privileged communication with Crown counsel, provided they remain at arms length from actual prosecution in an advisory capacity only. The author then calls for this "accidental consistency " to become more clearly codified in future jurisprudence and argues that the optimum model to ensure the maintenance of privilege would be the use of independent, in-house counsel by the police.