Clifford Chance has threatened to end the contract of one its trainees after a video appeared on YouTube of him behaving like a massive tool, and was promptly circulated around the City.
In "Shark Tales 2", a journalist takes to the streets "in search of drunken wisdom". Which essentially involves filming pissheads in Oxford in the small hours of the morning as they proclaim their views on homosexuality, feminism and the City. Cue the trainee at 4:14 in this clip.
For those who can't check this out at work, the brief exchange is as follows:
- I’m a City lad and I f*cking love the ladness. I love the City.
- The ladness?
- I love the ladness and I love the City, so I’m basically a perfect City lad.
- What is the ladness?
- The ladness is just basically f*cking people over for money.
- F*cking people over for money?
- Yeah.
That grinding sound that accompanies the clip is Lord Denning turning in his grave. However trashed the trainee may have been, it seems he was ultimately sober enough to realise that his comments might be career-limiting if heard by a wider audience. At the end of the clip, at 6:41, he grabs the mic and says "I refuse my consent for this to go on the internet, and I WILL sue you if it goes on".
However that last ditch ploy seems unlikely to save him the wrath of Clifford Chance. A spokeswoman said "The comments made are inappropriate and they are at odds with our principles and the professional standards we espouse as a firm. One of our trainee lawyers is the subject of our formal disciplinary procedures which may result in termination of the training contract with the firm".
Tip Off ROF
In "Shark Tales 2", a journalist takes to the streets "in search of drunken wisdom". Which essentially involves filming pissheads in Oxford in the small hours of the morning as they proclaim their views on homosexuality, feminism and the City. Cue the trainee at 4:14 in this clip.
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A Clifford Chance trainee f*cking someone over yesterday |
For those who can't check this out at work, the brief exchange is as follows:
- I’m a City lad and I f*cking love the ladness. I love the City.
- The ladness?
- I love the ladness and I love the City, so I’m basically a perfect City lad.
- What is the ladness?
- The ladness is just basically f*cking people over for money.
- F*cking people over for money?
- Yeah.
That grinding sound that accompanies the clip is Lord Denning turning in his grave. However trashed the trainee may have been, it seems he was ultimately sober enough to realise that his comments might be career-limiting if heard by a wider audience. At the end of the clip, at 6:41, he grabs the mic and says "I refuse my consent for this to go on the internet, and I WILL sue you if it goes on".
However that last ditch ploy seems unlikely to save him the wrath of Clifford Chance. A spokeswoman said "The comments made are inappropriate and they are at odds with our principles and the professional standards we espouse as a firm. One of our trainee lawyers is the subject of our formal disciplinary procedures which may result in termination of the training contract with the firm".
Comments
(Oh, and don't become a corporate lawyer where they have no sense of humour).
Presumably they think people actually believe the "oh we TOTALLY care about the community BS that all firms (and their clients) come out with.
Maybe after he gets fired he can get a job at a City firm.
I'm saying it's a bit of a barrel of dicks scenario.
1. Any self respecting normal person (male or female) would take a light hearted approach and speak to the interviewer - what sort of a c**t who isn't a film star shuns that sort of limelight?
2. This was clearly a sarcastic response. Interviewer was looking for a reaction for his silly little YouTube series and this was a sarcastic response in good humour, knowing what the interviewer was looking for.
3. If you are somebody who thinks this is out of order you are most likely one if the following types of people:
i) a dweeby shy wimp who is jealous of people who possess any sort of personality;
ii) a bitter failed law student desperate for a training contract and desperate to disprove the theory that the reason you didn't get a training contract is because you are not good enough;
iii) a jobsworthy HR person (plenty of parking attendant positions going); or
iv) a sad act in every way (despite what your mum says you don't have anything going for you)
It's all well and good for you to say that, but it doesn't really matter if you live the life of a saint if you come across as a gobby retard talking about what a 'lad' you are for sitting in windowless rooms doing DD. I sincerely doubt this does not represent his real views since his bit about threatening legal action rather makes one think he had something to hide. If he was being satirical, it would have been obvious (and he would have said 'you do understand I'm parodying city culture, right?').
Publicly threatening to revoke his TC is inappropriate and reflects very badly on Clifford Chance.
I know I'm a bit out of touch but if you allow yourself to be filmed under what law can you sue people for distributing the film?
Or is it possible that this trainee has a bit more knowledge than me
Even if what you just posted wasn't rubbish, the gusto with which you have jumped onto this badwagon (witchhunt?) may in fact suggest that you are falling short of your own lofty standards
Heh! The interviewer is good. This isn't really a big deal re CC trainee....its just one of those things that drunk people say (a) to be funny and hopefully don't mean; or (b) when they forget themselves when drunk (but actually secretly think it - in which case its just deluded and a bit sad). No big deal though but very amusing - CC should let it go.
Some of you seriously need to get lives and refamiliarise yourselves with the notion of a joke. There is nothing “offensive” about claiming in a jocular manner that the City is about fvcking people over for money. More to the point, nobody ACTUALLY finds it offensive. People just enjoy manufacturing fake offence – since we ceased to manufacture anything else in this country, it’s become the national pastime (that and f*cking people over for money).
Also, let me expose the delusion of some of the posters on this thread:
“We were taught very early on in our training contract to always watch what we say especially to journalists at all times”: no you weren’t. Media training for trainee solicitors? LOL. Be serious, pal. And even if you were, for some reason, given Max Clifford style PR advice on the firm’s ticket, all that proves is your employers were sanctimonious pillocks.
“Clients of any law firm would be less than delighted to see such an attitude from their lawyers”. Clients do not read Rollonfriday, or even the respectable legal press, and clients do not care what trainee solicitors say when drunk. At all. End of. Clients do not give a **** provided they get their documents on time at the lowest possible price. As you will all learn when you leave law school and start doing some work for a living.
“He is a trainee solicitor. That means he should act like a lawyer”: oh. My. God. OMG OMG. Did you ACTUALLY type that? If so – if the prig-o-matic virus hasn’t infected your PC without you knowing – may I suggest you have a long, serious word with yourself in a dark room, and avoid contact with society until the word’s been had?
The praise for the student “journalist” is pathetic. Firstly, ethically speaking he is bang out of order causing people embarrassment and professional distress like this by doorstepping them when they’re drunk, and to prove what? That trainee solicitors get drunk? GREAT STORY. The guy clearly thinks he’s Louis Theroux – well, he has the snideness and the trendy glasses, but none of the relevance. Also, the CC guy refused permission for the clip to be used. Most professional journalists would have very serious qualms about using interview material without an interviewee’s consent.
I shall also convene a meeting with CC top brass over this, and shall make clear to them in no uncertain terms that this guy is to be left unmolested. Which let’s face it is what’s going to happen anyway – there is no earthly way CC are going to pick a fight over this in this increasingly competitive graduate recruitment market.
They were bang out of order publicly threatening to sack him before his case had been heard – this is far more offensive than anything he said in the clip.
Isn't ROF respectable? (although I doubt the Lawyer would have a blog focussing on cat's ar$e$ on its front page).
I don't agree that my comment "casts our profession in a terrible light". I think it casts the profession in a good light. My comment might make some people think that all lawyers are boring and have no personality, but I wouldn't worry myself if someone was narrow-minded enough to believe that.
I think a lawyer should go about their private life acting as a lawyer. This doesn't mean they have to be talk about due diligence all day, refuse to do something even mildly illegal or get on their moral high horse whenever they can. It just means that they should know how to portray themselves in a respectable light, not because the SRA would jump for joy, but because lawyers have a good excuse to be men of integrity. Sure, you don't have to – and I'm not suggesting you should get fired if you don't – but I would want my lawyer to be classy enough to portray himself well socially, not least because that gives a good indication of how he will play his business life. Everyone does what they want in private, a lawyer should be streetwise enough to know you have to be careful when a camera is shoved in your face. These may be lofty standard and I may not always live up to them, but that doesn't make them any less respectable.
I also didn't jump onto any bandwagon/witch-hunt. I just suggested that this guy undermined himself, which he clearly did. I bet he regrets saying this, because it shows a lack of judgment on his part.
tbh, I sincerely doubt those higher up in CC know about this, let alone care about it (lol at the 'top brass' ... they aren't the general staff m8)
Should we consider an open letter (In our real names of course)? As members of this guy's profession I think we have a duty to stand up and be counted and not let CC get away with treating him like this.
I am a former Clifford Chance trainee myself and the firm would never have acted like this in those days.
I first saw this story in the Telrgraph and it made the trainee, Clifford Chance and the profession in general look terrible.
How do you think clients feel when they receive their bills? Do you think they are eager to pay? How about ehen the see an item that is "thinking time" for a Senior Associate and they pay £10 a minute for that time.
Now condsider how they feel receiving a bill with an item lile that from a firm whose trainees appear to be inculcated with the ethos that their role is "to fuck people over for money". How can a client possibly have faith in a firm that supports trainers who make such statements? If they had kept him it would have suggested that what he said is true. He was an irresponsible idiot and far from ruining his life, once he gets over the shock he may well find that a career outside of law is better for him.
What planet are you on? Lawyers are paid to think. Clients know that. Don't like it? Don't instruct a lawyer.
It seems to me that most of you have little idea of the current market for legal services.
If you think clients are indifferent when they read articles which show employees of their service providers say "I f**k people over for money" then you are at best deluded and at worst plain wrong.
You may see it as a silly joke. I can assure you that many others did not. Noone wants to be "f**ked over", nor do they wish to be perceived as using lawyers to f**k someone else over on their behalf.
Reputation is the major tool in legal marketing. This muppet dragged CC's through the mud. Laddish? F**k people over? These are the phrases people asdociate with the worst recent excesses of the City. CC rightly in my view wishes to distance itself from that as far as possible.
Here's a suggestion. If you want to be a part of a masiive international law firm and earn more as a trainee than most people in the country earn after 20 years of work, don't spout arrogant embarassing garbage to people with cameras when you're drunk. If you do embarass your employer in the national press, don't expect to stay.
Bigotry? Jesus. What a smug tit.
18/09/2013 11:25
Also, let me expose the delusion of some of the posters on this thread:
“We were taught very early on in our training contract to always watch what we say especially to journalists at all times”: no you weren’t. Media training for trainee solicitors? LOL. Be serious, pal. And even if you were, for some reason, given Max Clifford style PR advice on the firm’s ticket, all that proves is your employers were sanctimonious pillocks.
Laz, let me expose your delusions. You don't know what trainees are taught in every firm in the City, and this certainly happens at mine. Whether it means the trainee's bosses are sanctimonious pillocks or not is hardly a delusion on the part of the trainee citing the practice. Do try to grow a brain.
I am both a former CC trainee and client. Although by no means indicative, I have enough common sense to understand that these comments do not represent the firm's views and were just a poor attempt at being funny when a camera was stuck in his face. If he has already been terminated, as suggested by someone above, this is a huge over reaction. I cant see the SRA upholding this, if it wants to take itself seriously. Not sure which " professional offence " has been committed other than being a bit of a knobhead
You seem to be rather a judgmental type, telling people that they have little idea of this and that when those who say he should not be terminated are just mostly expressing an opinion as had you.Given this, I would think you have a future in management in a big firm as being judgmental by nature, with a perhaps a sprinkling of hypocrisy ( dont worry you can pick that up along the way if lacking it now ) would make one perfectly qualified for the job
Your sarcasm is an embarassment. Are you suggesting that there is something wrong with being discriminating in whom one employs? Do you honestly think that it is possible to have a career in law without making judgements? Which open is better for the client, which carries more risk, which creates opportunities and which denies them? Calling someone judgemental as an insult is something best left back at the student union. When you're out with the grown ups you'll need to make judgements every day of your life. The silly boy from this article who is now contemplating his UB40 form didn't use any judgement at all. Look where that got him.
The UK's young lawyers would be far better off in terms of the deal they get from their employers if they DID have someone of the ferocity of Len McCluskey or some other traditional unionist representing them.
And when CC said they wete going to sack him regardless do you think all the other trainees would go on strike?