[2024] UKUT 264 (LC)

Members are not required by the Constitution to have a room in Chambers, but in practice all do and on joining Chambers a new Member is allocated a Room. Members rarely move to a different Room and when this does happen it is usually because one has become available on the retirement or departure of another Member. On those occasions the opportunity to move Rooms is offered to Members on the basis of seniority and there is no requirement for any individual to move.

Members are free to decide whether and how to decorate and furnish their Rooms and do so at their own expense (although Chambers’ administrative staff will assist in organising redecoration and liaising with contractors when requested). Some Members have incurred considerable expense in decorating and furnishing their Rooms in the expectation that they will remain in occupation for a long time.

Members may, if they wish, work exclusively from home and not use their Room at all but, at the material date, the great majority of Members carried out most of their work from their own Rooms. When they are present, Members are not prohibited from using their Rooms for non-business purposes (although there was no evidence that they did so), and no checks are made on the uses to which they put their Rooms.

Each Member has a key to their own Room, as well as a key to the door of Chambers premises (and a fob to turn the burglar alarm on and off), so that they have access to their Room at all times. In 2014 a memo was circulated by the appellant on behalf of the Management Committee informing Members of its decision to adopt measures relating to confidential information, including a requirement that Members must keep their doors locked overnight and at other times when they were not in the building. Members do not have keys for each other’s Rooms, and do not use each other’s Rooms for any purpose, but both the clerks and the cleaners have keys and are able to enter Members’ Rooms when they need to. The set of duplicate keys for staff use are kept secure and are not available for general use.

The confidential nature of much of Chambers’ work, the fact that Members frequently need to discuss instructions with their professional clients in conference or remotely, and the fact that they are often on opposite sides in the same litigation make sharing Rooms impractical. Occasions on which it has been necessary for Members to be asked to share have therefore been infrequent and temporary. The appellant could recall three occasions since Chambers moved to Bedford Row when very junior Members had been recruited on the understanding that they would be required to share a Room until space became available for them each to have their own. Since September 2023 two Members who now work mostly from home have also chosen to share to reduce their expenses. Other than under the terms of the parental leave and part-time working policy (which were never invoked and which he regarded as exceptional) the appellant did not think it would be within the power of Chambers to insist on a Member moving Rooms or to require sharing, and even if technically it was within the power of an AGM he did not think that in practice it would ever happen.

No written or other formal agreements are entered into by Members relating to the use or occupation of their Rooms, other than the Constitution (which deals with payment) and the parental leave and part-time working policy (which at the material day dealt with sharing). In practice formal arrangements are largely unnecessary (except to satisfy regulatory requirements, such as in relation to parental leave) and for the most part Members relate to one another on a basis of trust and informality. Members understand that, generally, they will have their Room for as long as they want it and on the infrequent occasions when someone would prefer to move and no empty Room has been available a solution has been found, whether out of collegiality, self-interest, or a bit of both.