* No court closures and no impact on “frontline” business was the message this
week from Sir Suma Chakrabarti, the Ministry of Justice Permanent
Secretary, and his colleagues when grilled by the Commons Justice Committee
on the impact of cuts. So how will the £1 billion savings disclosed by The
Times be made? Shared buildings is one way. Although not called a
closure, it is planned to merge tribunal and civil court centres in London
into one, saving on ten to twelve tribunal buildings. Another is “levels of
productivity”, which varies by 100 per cent from area to area, plus savings
in “procurement” costs and on buildings. Some “middle management” layers
also may go in the Prison Service. Talks are continuing. And are judges
happy? “I am not necessarily saying that,” was Sir Suma’s reply.
* Stand up for the judge! Sir William Gage, heading the public inquiry
into the death of Baha Musa, an Iraqi who was arrested by British soldiers
in Basra in 2003 and died in their custody, has a keen eye for protocol. On
October 15, he made a statement at a preliminary hearing held in an office
building in Fleet Street. Before he entered, one of his staff announced to
the assembled gathering of journalists and lawyers that Sir William, who is
about to retire as Lord Justice of Appeal, would like everyone to stand up
when he appeared. Despite a few raised eyebrows, they obeyed.
* It’s one long round of valedictory parties for Sir Ken Macdonald
this week as he prepares to leave as Director of Public Prosecutions. Staff
are sorry to see him go — his tenure is regarded as a success for the Crown
Prosecution Service (CPS), even if the Bar has mixed views about the drive
for CPS advocates to do more trials. Sir Ken’s appointment was “left of
field”, so who is taking credit for it? Step forward his predecessor, now
Sir David Calvert-Smith, a High Court judge. “I suggested him,” he told Law
Diary proudly.
* Jack Straw has admitted it. People do not love the Human Rights Act.
The reason? The September 11 attacks that happened within a year of the Act
taking effect, he told a conference held by Justice, the human rights group.
In reality the Act did not impede efforts to counter terrorism, he said. But
that was not the public perception.
* Some 4500 top lawyers gathered in Buenos Aires for the International Bar
Conference is clearly too much of a good opportunity. Word has gone out
to the local criminal fraternity, one lawyer tells The Water Cooler, and an
estimated 20-30 lawyers have already been robbed in the street. One lawyer
was even fleeced right outside the Sheraton Conference Centre, where the
conference is being held over five days. One lawyer from New York lost a
$10,000 watch and attendees have been advised to instruct taxis to take a
circuitous route between venues. The latest trick? Sewage. "Two lawyers
had sewage thrown on them as a distraction while they were robbed," our
source says. Lawyers and sewage? We won't say the obvious.
* The Law Society has caused a big furore with plans to open its doors
to non-solicitors after 63 per cent of council members voted in favour of
creating a new "affiliate category." The final decision now rests with a
postal ballot of the society - deadline was due on Friday, October 24. The
new affiliate status would be open to six categories of indivdiual working
in legal services in the UK and overseas. They would play no role in the
governance of the society and would not be llowed to stand for council seats
or attend general meeetings. The idea, according to past society president
Kevin Martin is to increase its income. He told the council: "This is not
about letting in the barbarians at the gates. There will be safeguards. The
brand will not be watered down," he said. But there is concern in some
quarters, such as Holborn practitioners, that affiliates would eventually
want voting rights and the right to stand for council. Fraser Whitehead,
council member for Holborn, gave warning that a "huge number" of people
would become eligible. "It will not be in the hundreds of thousands but tens
of hundreds of thousands." Others have condemned the move as a "disgrace"
and "backward step." Arthur Weir, a solicitor of the Westminster
and Holborn Law Society, also argues that the process securing approval for
the move is unconconstitutional and that the process for the ballot has
defective in several ways, for instance, the society "published" the notice
on its website but in a way that no-one would have noticed, he says - intead
of sending out notices of the meeting and resolution by post. Stand-by for
further (legal?) action of the ballot goes the "wrong" way. He says: "These
are no mere formalities. The proposals are controversial. They would remove
from the members [of the Law Society] the power to decide themselves
questions about extending membership to non-solicitors . . . " The process
is "a travesty of fair and honourable dealing," he adds. "It would be
unacceptable in an industrial trades union. To find it at the heart of a
learned professional society dedicated to law and justice is startling and
depressing."
* There's still time for barristers to sign up to this year's Bar Conference,
the profession's annual (and now only, since the Law Society conference was
abandoned) jamboree. This year's event, which takes places on Saturday 1
November at the Royal Lancaster Hotel, London (and carries professional
training points) boasts a star-studded programme which should appeal across
the board to criminal, commercial, family or international lawyers/human
rights alike. The packed timetable, with the overall theme of
"Multinationalism and multiculturalism - Tomorrow's World?") spans hate
crime, human trafficking, English and religious law, judicial appointments,
the commercial law on the international field, and equity. A highlight will
be the open forum debate, with its top speakers Mr Justice Edwin Cameron,
Judge of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Appeal of South Africa; Sir Konrad
Schiemann, Judge of the European Court of Justice and Lord Neuberger of
Abbotsbury, the law lord. To register contact: Judy Lane Consulting (JLC),
01494 433235, fax 0870 429 6874 or try the website: www.judylaneconsulting.com
* You're a good lawyer - don't you want to be judge? The Judicial
Appointments Commission has commissioned research to find out from
solicitors and barristers what attracts them or puts them off applying to be
judges. The research by the British Market Reearch Bureau takes place over
the next few months and will help the Commission in its aim of attracting a
wider range of candidates. Letters are going out to more than 6000 lawyers
explaining the research and encouraging them to take part. Baroness
Prashar, chairman of the JAC, said: "We have anecdotal evidence about
what needs to change. But the results of this survey will enable us to take
more directed and effective joint action to encourage greater diversity."
Among possible barriers, she added, were the minimum entry requirements and
inflexible working hours. Throwing down the gauntlet she added: "Only the
Lord Chancellor and the judiciary can change those".
* Will the Supreme Court be a different entity from the House of Lords
appellate committee? Lady Justice Arden certainly thinks so. Lady
Justice Arden, who is tipped to become the second-only woman in Britain's
highest court, tod a conference this week that the new court, which comes
into effect next autumn, is likely to evolve to meet changed public demands.
Its judgments, she told a human rights conference organised by Justice, the
campaign group and Sweet & Maxwell, had to be communicated clearly to the
public. "Things have changed radically in the last 50 years," she said. "The
public is no longer content to know what the law is. They want to know why
it is." She also asked if the new court should have different criteria for
selecting which cases it would hear - perhaps favouring those that raised
constitutional issues. The audience for such rulings, she said, is not just
the lawyers and the parties but the genral public.
* The House of Commons Justice Committee under Sir Alan Beith was not
exactly overjoyed with the Government's response to its July report on
sentencing. While some recommendations had been accepted, ministers had
failed to address the central problem - that "the lack of a choerent
sentencing policy" and "failure to allocate resources" so that courts can
mete out the most appropriate sentence, Sir Alan said. MPs were not
impresssed with the Carter review or his conclusions that "we build
mega-prisons at vast expense as an answer to the prison population." It is
all very well, added Beith, for ministers to say they have ensured that
courts have a full range of sentencing options at their disposal. But he
said: "how can that be effective when the probation services simply do not
have the resources to manage community sentences, or there are no places on
a community programme that is part of the sentence?"
* After his thorough report into the one-year Bar Vocational Course, Derek
Wood, QC, could be forgiven for thinking he'd done his bit for the Bar
Standards Board. But Wood, a property litigator of Falcon Chambers,
did such a good job - every recommendation has been adopted - that he was
asked and has agreed to undertake another review, this time of the pupillage
system. The task is a tough one: there is a squeeze on pupillage places,
with the latest figures showing that 1,730 students registered last year for
full and part-time BVC studies. But even discounting the 23 per cent of
overseas students, in any year about 3,200 graduates are jostling for 450
pupillages — the result of past unsuccessful graduates still on the hunt.
* It seems a "no brainer" - for the "voice of the child" to be heard in
children's care cases. But the real issue is how should that be done? The
issue was the topic for a timely debate this week hosted by the Family
Justice Council and chaired by Sir Mark Potter, President of the
Family Division. Anthony Hayden, QC, putting what he called the
"cautious" argument, argued forcibly that "of course the wishes and feelings
must be listened to and evaluated." But that meant more than a child being
paraded into court "simply to take a snapshopt of his views", he said. The
process was "subtle, multi-faceted and often difficult to penetrate", he
said. Children's wishes were often expressed obliquely, and within a
"maelstrom of conflicing pressures, loyalities and emotions." The court, he
said, was a "wholly inappropriate environment" in which to elicit that
crucial evidence. The full audio debate is available on www.family-justice-council.org.uk
