the barrister
#35
ESSENTIAL READING FOR BARRISTERS
Est. 1999
11th January 2008 - 19th March 2008 HILARY TERM ISSUE
www.barristermagazine.com
ISSN 1468-926X
Raising the Bar: the importance of quality The issue of quality assurance has become one of the most important issues in professional regulation. Clients’ expectations are changing. Consumers are more willing to challenge poor service and have a greater tendency to question professional opinion. They want to know whether their lawyer is competent at what he or she does. In this article we seek to outline the Bar Standards Board’s (BSB) commitment to quality assurance and to explain why it is a priority. We will also describe the way in which the BSB proposes to address this question and how it fits with other initiatives that are being carried on by other bodies. Barristers have a vital role in the justice system. Courts rely on barristers to be up to date in their knowledge of the law and to be competent advocates. Clients rely on the advice and services that they receive from barrister because it can affect their rights, liberty, family and financial position.
The BSB must ensure in the public interest that barristers are performing to a consistently high standard. Research that the BSB has undertaken makes it clear that most clients and solicitors rate very highly the service that they obtain from MARK STOBBS the Bar. But this Director of the Bar is not a reason for Standards Board complacency. Nor does the BSB consider that the old view that the market p.38 sorts out the best performers is neces-
2008 Bar chairman sets out visions for barristers to compete in reformed legal services market Timothy Dutton QC, who took over as Bar Council Chairman on 1 January, set out his agenda for the Bar in his inaugural speech to the 2007 Bar Council, by calling for barristers to compete in the reformed legal services market. He said that regulation of the profession in the new legislative climate would create opportunities for the Bar, at home and abroad: “In 2008 I want every member of the profession to know the important fact; that the Bar Council works in their interests across all ranges of discipline. A number of steps will be taken to strengthen ties and to ensure better communication to the profession of what we are doing. These will bind together Circuits, Specialist Bar Associations, the Bar Council and individual barristers with stronger lines of communication and reporting, maximising our use of new technology in pursuit of this. “My job is to promote the Bar and our system not just at home but internationally. All of us are operating in an international market with Eng-
lish law as an attractive option in commercial disputes. In criminal law there is an increasingly international aspect to the work, and in family also. I intend to promote the values and skills of the Bar as advocates, arbitrators and mediators abroad.” The Legal Services Act 2007 would also present an opportunity to regulate advocacy more widely: “I have little doubt, as it becomes possible for advocates to choose by whom they are regulated, that the Bar Council (with the BSB functioning independently in the decisions it makes under Section 29 of the Legal Services Act 2007) will become the preferred regulator of barristers and many senior solicitor advocates. We have a history of skilled regulation of advocacy through regulating the Bar. That regulation has enjoyed public confidence and has received repeated praise from the Ombudsman. We are cheaper than the Solicitors Regulation Authority – by a massive degree. Our voice is p.6 strongly heard and respected in Parliament, the press and wider public. Why
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Features
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DNA ON TRIAL The Government recently consulted on proposals to expand police powers further, by allowing police to take DNA from those arrested for non-recordable offences, which would include, for example, littering and minor traffic offences. It is our view that this is disproportionate to the aims of identifying a person and of confirming whether or not a person was at a crime scene. By Professor Sir Bob Hepple QC, FBA, of Blackstone Chambers, Chairman of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics
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PERSONAL MITIGATION This study examined the role of personal mitigation in sentencing in the Crown Court. The topic is important because decisions about mitigating and aggravating factors actually define the detail of any sentencing framework grounded in proportionality. It is the ways in which sentencing practice deviates from the principle that the punishment should fit the crime that constitute the interesting penological questions. By Dr Jessica Jacobson and Professor Mike Hough
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CPD: HAVE WE BEEN HOODWINK? WHY CPD NEEDS REFORM AND LESS REGULATION Many barristers were taken a bit by surprise when the implications of the Access To Justice Act hit home to the mass of our members and that regulatory dinosaur called ‘Continuous Professional Development’ (CPD) rose its “ugly” head - as far as some, mainly older, members were concerned. By Phillip Taylor MBE, Abbey and Richmond Chambers
News p.18 Beyond naming and shaming p.19 Welcome for Court of Appeal result Editor: Nigel Simmonds 0870 766 2715 email: info@barristermagazine.com Publishers: Media Management Corporation Ltd Publishing Director: Derek Payne Design and Production: Alan Pritchard Cambridge Printing Park Tel: 01223 423000