City lawyer who called colleague ‘Jabba the Hutt' ordered to pay £30,000
A City lawyer has been told to pay £31,000 to the solicitors' watchdog after admitting giving his colleagues 'rude' nicknames including 'Pol Pot' and 'Jabba the Hutt'.
Benedict Foster, a former senior solicitor in BNP Paribas' London offices, was charged £15,000 by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and told to pay an extra £16,000 in costs after admitting to using 'inappropriate' language in the workplace.
In submissions to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT), the City lawyer admitted using an array of 'offensive' monikers to describe his work colleagues at the French bank, including 'Mad Paul' and 'the Twittering Fool', while working as head of legal in its debt and equity capital markets division between December 2020 and September 2021.
Mr Foster also admitted using the nickname 'Hu She' to refer to an East Asian colleague and using the moniker 'Biriyani' to refer to an Indian coworker in submissions to the SDT.
The City lawyer's nicknames for his coworkers were first discovered through an internal probe that was launched by BNP Paribas in 2021, after a complaint was lodged against him by a colleague during an exit interview.
BNP Paribas later reported the findings of its investigation to the Solicitors Regulation Authority in March 2022. The French bank 'negotiated an exit' with Mr Foster the same month.
The submissions showed Mr Foster used an array of 'derogatory monikers' for colleagues in BNP Paribas' London headquarters, both on emails and video calls, over the course of almost a year.
In his submissions to the SDT, Mr Foster admitted calling his colleagues various 'unprofessional' names, almost entirely without their knowledge. Mr Foster also acknowledged the monikers would likely cause offence to his co-workers, if they were to find out about the nicknames, even if they were to share his sense of humour.
In seeking to defend himself, Mr Foster said his use of the nickname 'Hu She' was intended to be a reference to the 'Who He? Joke in Private Eye magazine, even while agreeing the moniker could be interpreted as 'mocking or ridiculing a traditional Chinese name'.
Mr Foster also denied that the moniker 'Mad Paul' had worked to undermine his co-worker's credentials as a solicitor. He instead stated his repeated use of the 'offensive' name was a reference to his colleague's 'slightly cavalier approach to timekeeping, attendance at the office and his interpersonal skill'.
The SDT ruled Mr Foster had failed to uphold the standards expected of solicitors, failed to act with integrity, and failed to act in a way that 'encourages diversity, equity and inclusion' by using the offensive names for his colleagues.
BNP Paribas and Mr Foster were contacted for comment.
Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
an hour ago
US reports the arrest of another Chinese scientist with no permit to send biological material
DETROIT -- A Chinese scientist was arrested while arriving in the U.S. at the Detroit airport, the second case in days involving the alleged smuggling of biological material, authorities said Monday. The scientist is accused of shipping biological material months ago to staff at a laboratory at the University of Michigan. The FBI, in a court filing, described it as material related to certain worms and requires a government permit. 'The guidelines for importing biological materials into the U.S. for research purposes are stringent, but clear, and actions like this undermine the legitimate work of other visiting scholars,' said John Nowak, who leads field operations at U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The scientist was interviewed and arrested Sunday after arriving on a flight from China, where she is pursuing an advanced degree at Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan. She planned to spend a year completing a project at the University of Michigan. Her shipments, including an envelope stuffed inside a book, were intercepted last year and earlier this year and opened by authorities, the FBI said. The court filing doesn't indicate whether the FBI believes the biological material was risky, though U.S. Attorney Jerome Gorgon Jr. said smuggling "threatens our security." The scientist remains in custody awaiting a bond hearing Wednesday. 'It doesn't strike me as something that is dangerous in any way. But there are rules to ship biological material,' said Michael Shapira, a biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, who read the court filing and spoke to The Associated Press. The government last week charged two Chinese scientists who are accused of conspiring to smuggle a toxic fungus into the U.S. One was turned around at the Detroit airport and sent back to China last year, while the other, a researcher at the University of Michigan, was arrested. She remains in custody.
Business Insider
an hour ago
- Business Insider
Uber is teaming up with a Microsoft-backed startup to launch robotaxis on the chaotic roads of London
London's famous black cabs could be about to get some robotaxi competition. Uber and Wayve, a British AI startup backed by Microsoft and Nvidia, announced on Tuesday that they will trial fully driverless autonomous vehicles in London, as the ride-hailing giant steps up its robotaxi ambitions. The driverless ride-hailing service in the UK capital will see Uber deploy vehicles running Wayve's AI-powered self-driving tech in a pilot program. "If you prove this technology works here, you can literally drive anywhere. It's one of the hardest proving grounds," Wayve CEO Alex Kendall told Business Insider during a test drive ahead of the launch. The news comes after the UK government announced it would fast-track approval for pilots of self-driving taxis from 2027 to spring 2026. Wayve and Uber declined to say when the initial deployment will begin, or which global carmaker would provide the vehicles for the robotaxi service. After largely abandoning plans to build its own self-driving cars, Uber has shifted strategy and struck a spree of deals to add robotaxis operated by self-driving companies to its app. The company has a partnership with Google-backed Waymo to operate its autonomous taxis on the Uber platform in Austin and Phoenix, and has signed similar deals with Chinese robotaxi startups WeRide and Uber inked its deal with Wayve last year, agreeing to deploy self-driving vehicles powered by the British startup's technology on its platform in multiple markets around the world. Uber also invested in Wayve through an extension of the company's Series C fundraising round, which raised $1.05 billion from investors including Softbank, Nvidia, and Microsoft. The London-based startup, which has been testing its fleet of autonomous Ford Mach-Es with a safety driver in London for several years, has quickly become one of the buzziest names in the robotaxi industry. Wayve says its "AI driver" runs on an end-to-end AI model — an approach also adopted by Tesla — allowing it to react to the physical world in the same way a human would and drive anywhere, unlike rivals like Waymo, which rely on high-definition maps to operate their robotaxis. Speaking to Business Insider from the back of a Wayve self-driving car in central London, Wayve CEO Kendall said the company had tested its autonomous vehicles in 90 cities over the past 90 days. "It's a real demonstration of how well this technology generalizes. The diversity we saw on these roads is immense, from winding roads in the Swiss Alps and dirt tracks in Italy to diverse cities like Vancouver and Tokyo," said Kendall. He said the vehicles in the robotaxi service in London will initially use a mixed suite of sensors, including cameras, radar, and lidar (laser-based sensors), adding that the chaotic nature of London's roads made it the perfect place to trial Wayve's technology without a safety driver. During BI's test ride, Wayve's AI driver navigated a number of obstacles, such as roadworks in London's busy Kings Cross district. "The ambition is to be driving in every city Uber operates in with our robotaxis. And I think only through end-to-end machine learning can you reach that level of scale," he added.
CNBC
an hour ago
- CNBC
Treasury yields slip as U.S.-China trade talks enter Day 2
Treasury yields slipped Tuesday as U.S. and Chinese officials resumed trade negotiations in London for the second day. The 10-year Treasury yield was down almost 3 basis points to 4.456% at 3.30 a.m. ET. The 2-year yield slipped around one basis point to 3.993%. The 30-year yield was lower by 3 basis points to 4.921%. One basis point equals 0.01%. Yields and prices move inversely in the bond market. U.S.-China trade negotiations in London resumed on Tuesday, building on a recent call between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. On Monday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and Trade Representative Jamieson Greer had talks with Chinese officials. Both sides have intensified diplomatic efforts following weeks of escalating trade tensions and uncertainty sparked by Trump's broad import tariffs on China and other key trading partners in April. "While we await any concrete news, it's worth remembering that markets have been used to a lot of back-and-forth in recent weeks," Deutsche Bank's analysts said, in reference to how U.S. tariffs slapped on China went all the way up to 145%, before being slashed to 30%, among other instances of policy reversals. "There've been several twists and turns already, and markets are getting fairly used to this uncertainty by now," wrote in a note published Tuesday. Deflation in China is also putting pressure on the Chinese government to negotiate a trade deal with Trump that benefits both countries, said Ed Yardeni, president of Yardeni Research. China's consumer prices fell for a fourth consecutive month in May, with the CPI falling 0.1% from a year earlier, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed on Monday.
