The Law Society was embroiled in a new controversy last night when it emerged that a candidate for a seat on its ruling council is a solicitor who faces a £1.6m fraud trial and failed to mention the fact in his election statement.

Paul Baxendale-Walker, 38, and another accused, were charged in November 2000 with defrauding the pension fund of a now defunct manufacturing business. The serious fraud office, which is handling the prosecution, said the trial was expected to last three to four months and was due to start in September.

Mr Baxendale-Walker is one of four candidates contesting a seat representing solicitors from Westminster, central London, on the governing body for the 80,000 solicitors in England and Wales. One of his opponents,Sue Nelson, who holds the post, said: "It's between him and his conscience what he tells his constituents, as long as he acts consistently with his professional obligations."

In his election statement Mr Baxendale-Walker says he is an Oxford law graduate and former barrister who trained at Arthur Andersen accountants. He "built up a market-leading multinational specialist solicitor's firm from nothing" and is "a recognised published authority on commercial trusts and tax law".

A Law Society spokesman said it would be "undemocratic and prejudicial" if the society were to tell Westminster solicitors of Mr Baxendale-Walker's impending trial. He added: "There is no power in the Law Society bylaws to reject a nomination on the grounds that criminal proceedings are pending against a member who is otherwise qualified to stand."

Next month's election and AGM threaten yet further embarrassments for the society, including a motion of no confidence in its main board.

Ethnic minority lawyers are angry that the board has supported the president to be, Carolyn Kirby, amid a row over comments she made two years ago about a "culture" among Asian managers, and at the board's failure to take action against a past president, Robert Sayer, who was found guilty of "unconscious" race and sex discrimination against the vice-president of the time, Kamlesh Bahl.

Black and Asian lawyers have put down a motion of censure against Mr Sayer. They are also calling for an inquiry into whether institutional racism and sexism exists at the society.

The following correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and Clarifications column, Saturday July 20 2002





In the above article we reported that the solicitor Paul Baxendale-Walker was facing a fraud trial. We regret that the Serious Fraud Office did not inform us that Southwark crown court had stayed proceedings against Mr Baxendale-Walker as an abuse of process the afternoon before and we did not therefore include this in the article. We trust this has not caused him any undue embarrassment.