The SRA Code's rule against acting where clients' interests clash — when the prohibition bites, when the exceptions allow it, and what must be in place first.
Acting for two clients whose interests collide is forbidden by default, and the route around that bar is narrow and conditional. This chapter starts with the prohibition itself — what counts as a client conflict, the threshold of risk that engages it, and its reach across all work at firm level — before turning to the duty to assess for conflicts at the outset and throughout a retainer, including how a client conflict differs from an own interest conflict. It then examines the two exceptions, substantially common interest and competing for the same objective, and the three cumulative conditions of informed consent, effective safeguards and objective reasonableness that must be satisfied before either can be relied on. It closes with the problems that surface mid-retainer: material confidential information held for one client, and the point at which clients' disagreement makes continued joint representation impermissible.
