Comment 7 for bug 861694

I don't know if people are still having this problem, but the only way I have found that works is using 'synclient'

At the shell type the following (ignore the '$' obviously):

$ syncilent

this will bring up all of the parameters in a long list. The ones you want start with 'RightButtonArea'. By default these are all set to '0' - i.e. right click/right button emulation is not enabled.

Believe it or not, If you want to use the right hand side of the trackpad for right clicking, I have found that you enable 'RightButtonAreaLeft' ON, rather than 'RightButtonAreaRight' which would be the more logical choice. So in the shell type the following:

$ synclient RightButtonAreaLeft=1

This works for me repeatedly on multiple distros, including 13.10 Saucy Salamander daily build in September 9th 2013.