Monday Message 10.02.25
The dreaded warned list trial
We await receipt of the National Listing Protocol which has been drafted by the judicial team led by HHJ Edmunds KC. We hope that it abolishes the practice of listing trials in warned lists. Whilst it might suit Courts for trials to be brought in to fill a gap at some stage with less than 24 hours’ notice it causes huge amounts of last minute work and stress for all participants in the trial process. For a victim, or a person waiting to give evidence, a person accused of a crime, a fortnight of worry and anxiety can end with the case not actually going ahead at all or being told that your trial is going ahead, going to court, facing the anxiety, only to be told that your trial cannot in fact take place. Lives are placed on hold.
For the Criminal Bar, warned lists cause our younger practitioners to leave the profession in droves. You are given a trial to conduct in a telephone call at 1700. If defending, you must book your trains or leave home that night to stay in a hotel if you cannot arrive early enough to do all that you need before the time that the trial is listed and you will not be reimbursed for your expenses. You must arrange and pay for childcare for the next day because you will have to leave and return after school hours. You will need to stay up late to read case papers and be trial ready. In the morning, you will have to introduce yourself to a traumatised person who has never met you before and gain sufficient trust to enable them to allow you to conduct their case. If the case does not start and is adjourned you will be paid £437.00 once the trial has been concluded. In cases where the defendant is on bail the trial is likely to be in 12-24 months’ time. That means that a junior Counsel will have to pay often in the region of £200 and receive nothing in return for two years.
These working practices are discriminatory against women and those from socially deprived backgrounds, but also against those struggling to pay housing costs and to repay student loans. Junior Barristers are often asked to conduct warned list cases and work late into the evening to get them ready. Why would you remain in a profession that is costing you money to work? If warned list cases remain, then payment for trials which are not reached and travel costs must be paid within a short period of time. We are losing our junior practitioners in droves. We ask the Government to help us to retain them.
Work experience
A new report from the Sutton Trust has found that nearly half of legal employers offer unpaid or underpaid internships. This means that graduates from working-class backgrounds are significantly less likely to be able to afford to undertake internships. These are of course more likely in the less lucrative areas of law such as criminal law. No doubt the same concern would apply to mini-pupillages. For students to undertake a week long mini-pupillage may require them to stay away from their own accommodation or to have expensive daily travel costs. Working with our Young Bar and the EDI Committee, we will be developing a mini-pupillage strategy for the Criminal Bar to ensure that the ability to have exposure to life as a Criminal Barrister does not depend on your financial start in life.
Defence and CPS Fees
The work on providing statistical information to the Ministry of Justice on defence fees continues with teams from the CBA and Bar Council working tirelessly together to produce the necessary documentation in advance of the April deadline. We hope that the work that we undertake will result in the increases to fees which were recommended in the Government’s own independent body the CLAAB led by HH Deborah Taylor. We will then seek equality in fees with the CPS.
That work is ongoing but work that remains and continues to be a constant plea from the CBA to the CPS is that of parity of fees. Prosecutors must be paid the same for conducting a criminal trial as the defence. Some serious deficiencies remain despite repeated requests for the CPS to demonstrate the value that they place on those who prosecute cases such as rape, the murder of a child, causing death by dangerous driving and terrorism.
Decision Time
Many of those who remain at the Criminal Bar are waiting until April to see what the joined-up consequences of the Leveson and Gauke Reviews cause the Treasury to provide to keep the Criminal Justice System alive and functioning. We are a cost-effective and vital part of that. We make it plain that further delay and prevarication will lead to a mass exodus of Counsel who will simply turn to more lucrative work. Our patience should not be viewed as anything other than short-term and it masks frustration and anger and successive Governmental failures to listen and to act.
Student Membership
The CBA has a student membership for all those completing an LLB or the BTC. We welcome all students who wish to have a career at the Criminal Bar to join us. Details can be found here.
Lectures
Two events by our brilliant Education Committee are coming up. The first is the lecture on County Lines, Human Trafficking and Exploitation on the 19th February 2025 and the second is Understanding and Developing your practice at the Criminal Bar on 12th March 2025. Both of these lectures which carry CPD points are free to members.
Please also note that if you are in your first five years of practice there is a 55% reduction in the cost of Archbold 2025.
Gop Hooper
The CBA and Thomas More Chambers are very sad to announce the death of Gop Hooper, who passed away suddenly on 2nd February 2025, aged 78.
He was an immensely positive and encouraging senior member of Chambers, a much-loved friend and former colleague. He was kind, generous with his time, clever and wise.
In short, Gop was an unforgettable character and wonderful man, who brought joy to the lives of all those lucky enough to have known him. He will be greatly missed.
We extend our heart-felt condolences to Gop’s family at this awful time.
Funeral arrangements have not yet been confirmed, but will be announced when they are known.
Yours,
Mary Prior KC
Chair of The Criminal Bar Association.