Public judgment details dispute between Frederick Barclay and nephews

A public judgment published today has given details of a private legal dispute that has been going on between the families of tycoons the Barclay brothers. Billionaire tycoon Sir Frederick Barclay and his daughter Amanda are involved in a dispute over a bug allegedly placed in the Ritz Hotel by Sir David Barclay’s son Alistair. Sir Frederick had been seeking an interim non-disclosure order at a hearing at the High Court in London earlier this week. However, in a ruling read out on Monday that was transcribed and published today, High Court judge Mr Justice Warby refused. The judgment is the first public ruling in a dispute that has been running behind closed doors since January between the families of Sir Frederick and his twin brother Sir David. The defendants are three of Sir David’s sons – Alastair, Aidan and Howard – Aidan’s son Andrew and Philip Peters, a board director of the Barclay group. “This action has its origins in the claimants’ discovery, on 13 January 2020, that Alastair Barclay had been secretly recording conversations between the claimants, held at The Conservatory at the Ritz Hotel,” the judgment said. “Evidence obtained since the action began has revealed that such recording was being undertaken from about early November 2019. Transcripts of some of the conversations have been made, recordings have been kept and there have been discussions between the defendants about the material, the transcripts or their significance, over WhatsApp and perhaps in other ways.” Sir Frederick and his daughter are suing the defendants, arguing that the the recorded conversations cover a range of private and confidential issues, such as disposals and acquisitions of business assets, and the financing and management of group business. At Monday’s hearing lawyers for Sir Frederick asked for an order banning the defendants from using the information they had obtained. “It is a striking feature of this litigation that in the six weeks or so that have passed since the claimants discovered that their conversations had been bugged, there has never been any application to the court for an order restraining the use or disclosure of the information acquired by doing so,” Warby J said in his ruling. “Applications of that kind are a commonplace, indeed standard feature of claims in confidence or privacy, where undertakings to maintain secrecy have not been forthcoming. There have been opportunities to seek such relief. The case has been before a judge on at least six occasions before today. “The inference that I had previously drawn was that the claimants did not consider that there was a real threat of misuse or onward disclosure of their private or confidential information, or at least not a sufficient threat to call for the imposition by the court of restrictions on disclosure and use.” He added: “Whatever the reasons may be, it seems to me that the claimants need to demonstrate a clear and compelling justification for bringing this application [at this stage].” In his ruling Warby said that there had been a negotiation between the claimant and defendant lawyers about what constituted confidential information and how it should be used. Warby said that, given the short time frame, the negotiated agreement appeared to be a reasonable solution. He said he wouldn’t make an injunction order. However, if Sir Frederick and his daughter feel the need for further restrictions and are unable to do it via negotiation, they will have to apply again to the court, he said. Photo: Stefan Kiefer/imageBROKER/Shutterstock