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7 April to 17 April

Time estimates are notoriously difficult to get right. But even with a late start on the first day of trial, I was still confident that I would spend most of the second week of the Easter half term with my family. Oh, how wrong I was. And oh, how the guilt crept in. The guilt dissipated however when, half way through the second week of this trial (listed for 4-5 days), it came to a sudden and unexpected end. I then had two whole days to spend with the children – hurrah! By the end of day two, the children asked tentatively “when can we go back to holiday club mommy?”

Just why this trial dragged on was due largely to unforeseen and uncontrollable factors. But it was also due in part to what became a recurring theme throughout the trial; the almost total lack of any agreement between the trial judge and defence counsel on nearly every topic. It was the legal equivalent of “You say tomato…”, except neither of us was prepared to call the whole thing off.

I am really pleased I am not a judge. The business of judging is a difficult thing. It requires, among many skills, an ability to intervene only where necessary to assist the jury. Intervene too much on one side or the other, and the tribunal risks appearing partisan. I am glad to say in my relatively short time at the Bar; my encounters with judges have left me, in the main, feeling that I and my client have had a fair hearing.

The advocate faced with an interfering judge has a number of approaches they can adopt. One is to ignore the intervention, however frequent, and continue with the job. Another is to challenge the intervention head on. Sometimes a combination of these will be appropriate. My mother, if she had a computer, access to the internet and a desire to read this blog (unlikely) would know immediately which option I would instinctively go for. You see, even faced with a fairly dictatorial Caribbean mother I still managed to disagree with her as a child, far too often and much to her chagrin.

I don’t suppose the trial judge this week much liked this aspect of my personality, but that is just too bad. Although it has never been, nor will it ever be my style to annoy my tribunal (in fact in most cases this is counterproductive), very occasionally it becomes necessary to stand one’s ground – and that’s what I did. Unfortunately for me, my children also rather like the “standing one’s ground approach” particularly my daughter – which made for a rather interesting trip to a very crowded natural history museum on the Friday. More than once I caught myself thinking that I had had a much easier ride in court.

Shereener Browne

Many of you will now have seen the BSB’s Consultation on the Legal Services Act and its implications for regulating the profession, but perhaps not so many of you will realise the full context of the consultation or the importance of it. The Legal Services Act has created a new landscape for the provision of legal services. A landscape in which barristers and solicitors (and in the future other professionals such as accountants, conveyancers, surveyors etc.) may be able to enter into partnership together and provide a range of legal services from under one roof if the regulator considers this to satisfy the Act’s regulatory objectives. This is, it is said, good for consumers as it allows them to deal with multiple problems at one time and in one place and because it is believed that this will save the consumer money. The Bar Standards Board is therefore consulting the profession on the types of rule changes necessary to allow barristers to enter into and benefit from the new provisions in the act. The result of this consultation will shape the future of the regulation of barristers. Rules which prohibit partnership, including the cab rank rule, prohibit sharing facilities with solicitors, restrict the activities barristers can carry out and even those relating to handling money are all receiving the scrutiny they deserve. The Bar Council has put together a team of 15 leading members of the Bar, from all practice areas, to produce a thorough and considered response to the consultation and we are already seeing the emergence of a variety of views on the different aspects under discussion. The rule changes that are under discussion would only be permissive changes and they will not pressurise anyone to change the way they practice if it does not suit them. However, with the possible emergence of One Case One Fee and the prospect of tendering for publicly funded work it would be a mistake for the Bar Council not to think long and hard about how the Bar might want to reshape to meet the client’s demands and to benefit from any new fee arrangements. The Bar has the skills and the quality to take the lead on cases and serve the client’s interests and we must ensure that we are in a position to do so. The closing date for the consultation is the 9th of May and I suggest anyone with an interest in the future of the profession should consider responding. I am sure that, given the amount of people I have spoken to on the subject of ABS’s (including a group of solicitors in Leeds) and the views already expressed, some wide ranging and interesting responses will be produced.

Earlier this week I spent a very enjoyable day and evening in Wales, travelling firstly to Swansea, on the beautiful Gower peninsula, and then to Cardiff. After meetings in Chambers and at the Robing Room of Cardiff Crown Court where a wide range of topics were discussed, from Alternative Business Structures to One Case One Fee to Judicial Appointments and Recorder competitions, I was entertained at a Bar Mess where the debate continued. The Wales and Chester Bar are as vibrant as any other I have been to and equally as impressive and it acted as a reminder that the Bar only survives because of the quality of the people who come to it.

Timothy Dutton QC

24-28 March 2008

My trial this week is a classic example of how not to police a community. My young client lives in an area of East London where he and his friends have grown accustomed to intrusion in their daily lives by police officers and community support officers. They go to a shop; they are stopped and searched under the pretext of “a number of robberies occurring in the area”. They go out to play football; they are asked to move along. They are nearly always released without charged and sometimes never even get as far as the police station.

All of this they endure without complaint. Indeed my client did not even know he could complain. This type of harassment had become just as much part of his daily routine as brushing his teeth in the morning.

Barristers who were in practise in the 1980’s will recall “Operation Swamp” which saw large numbers of black youths stopped and searched in Brixton with little or no regard for the concept of reasonable suspicion. Those barristers will recall how the use of this arbitrary power led to a loss of public confidence in the police and ultimately to the Brixton riots.

At the time of the Brixton riots I was a school girl in St Kitts blissfully unaware of the daily plight of many Caribbean immigrants at the hands of an over-bearing police force in this country. However, on my return to the country of my birth, I too was made to feel the pinch of injustice. In my late teens I was stopped and searched on a very public street because, according to one officer, I was seen to look down upon seeing police officers following behind the car I was a passenger in. Nothing was found on me or my companion. I remember as if it was yesterday the rage and the humiliation I felt as I was made to stand against a shop front whilst a woman police officer searched me; the passengers of a packed number 68 bus watching the spectacle.

And so here we are in 2008 and another generation of young people are being treated in such a way so as to make them resent the police presence in their community.

So when police try to arrest a clearly agitated and clearly mentally unwell local man, his friends who witness the rather rough arrest, are tipped over the edge. Angry crowds shout and jeer at the police. One community support officer is kicked to the knee after pushing one young man. There is an angry stand off. And all the while, adult members of the community stand watching this spectacle and not one tries to intervene on behalf of the police.

I think it was John Locke who spoke about the social contract and how the state can only rule by consent. I sincerely hope that community police officers realise before we have another Brixton riot, that they can only effectively police a community if they have their consent and respect. And respect is a two-way street.

Shereener Browne