CEBCLA Seminar: Ethical Challenges Facing In-house Counsel – Issues and Case Studies

In jurisdictions such as Australia, a corporate counsel has the same professional and ethical obligations as any other legal practitioner. Importantly, the duty to the court and to the administration of justice prevails over all other duties, including the duty to act in the best interests of the client. In recent years, a debate has been underway over the role of corporate counsel and their involvement in corporate governance. In particular, should they act as the moral guardians or the moral conscience of an organisation? This paper explores the issues surrounding the debate from both an Australian perspective and a comparative perspective with reference to various case studies in Australia and overseas.

SPEAKER

Associate Professor Andrew Godwin

Associate Professor Andrew Godwin holds a number of senior positions at Melbourne Law School: Associate Dean (Engagement); Director of Transactional Law; Director of Studies in Banking and Finance Law; Associate Director of the Asian Law Centre. Andrew researches in the area of finance and insolvency law, financial regulation, property law and the regulation of the legal profession. Andrew has published extensively in both academic and professional journals and has acted as a consultant to the World Bank in the area of bank resolution and recovery (2016) and to the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry (2018).

CHAIR

Jointly organised by:

About SCCA

Established in 2002, the Singapore Corporate Counsel Association is the national organisation for corporate counsel in Singapore. SCCA promotes professional standards and provides developmental opportunities to help in-house lawyers in Singapore be Better Counsel. SCCA believes that Better Counsel make Better Corporations, and, in turn, Better Corporations make Better Communities. The executive committee of the SCCA is made up of volunteer in-house lawyers, and they are advised by SCCA’s Patron, the Attorney General of Singapore, who is also the chairman of the Board of Advisors. In 2017, SCCA launched its Competency Framework and Code of Conduct for corporate counsel.