Legal Services Bill [HL]

I too support the amendments, other than those tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, which as I see it are inconsistent with those to which the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, have spoken. In addressing this issue, I shall compare the disciplinary procedures of the Bar with those of the medical profession and those for solicitors. I should say in that context that, on two occasions, which I shall mention in a few moments, I have represented barristers who were the subject of significant disciplinary procedures. I spent 10 years as a lay member of the General Medical Council between 1989 and 1999, and sat throughout those 10 years on one or both of the professional conduct committee and the health committee, which has procedures analogous to the professional conduct committee. I have also represented solicitors on several occasions by advising them when they have faced proceedings before the solicitors’ disciplinary system. I shall talk about those two latter bodies first. My experience of the General Medical Council was that, although it was thorough, it was extremely legalistic. It operates its disciplinary procedures just like a criminal court. There are paid advocates on both sides. There is also a huge legal back-up system that includes in-house lawyers and out-of-house lawyers, whom the General Medical Council in effect employs—it certainly pays for them. Every case is fought as though it were a Crown Court criminal trial. Delays are endemic in the system, which is cumbersome, and despite the GMC’s efforts to reform that system, it has become ever more legalistic. I have not appeared before the solicitors’ disciplinary system but, as I said earlier, I have in a number of cases advised solicitors who were before it. Again, my experience of giving advice to those in trouble as solicitors is that it, too, is legalistic. It involves quasi-criminal procedures and a huge paper trail that can be very time-consuming. Of course, there is a very much larger number of solicitors than barristers. Nevertheless, the delays in the solicitors’ system are disproportionate to the sort of delays that occur in the barristers’ system. For the past five years or so, I have been the head of a large set of mainly criminal barristers’ chambers, which has about 80 barristers. The nature of such a set of chambers is that it deals with a very fast and large turnover of work involving a huge number of cases. The nature of the kind of work that is done in my chambers means that it is inevitable that complaints are made from time to time against barristers, particularly in criminal cases. People tend to protest their innocence in criminal cases, even when they have been convicted, because it provides a better explanation for the relations, if your Lordships see what I mean. It is sometimes much more satisfactory at home to claim that the noble and learned Baroness—or, indeed, the rest of us; we all have interests here, and many of us sit as recorders—might have got it wrong than to accept the result of the court proceedings. I have appeared twice as an advocate before the Bar disciplinary system. I hope that these are useful examples for informing the Minister of how the system works. On one occasion, I appeared for a barrister from a set of chambers other than my own with which I am associated—it is outside London. It was not a major complaint, but it was justified. He pleaded guilty, as it were. He appeared before the tribunal; a minimum amount of paper was involved; there was a delay amounting only to weeks; and there was a satisfactory outcome for all concerned. The case was ““prosecuted”” by someone who appeared pro bono, and it was defended by me, appearing pro bono, although I think I later received a single bottle of wine, very good though it was, for my trouble. The other occasion was an extremely substantial case, in which I had to appear for another Queen’s Counsel who was accused of potentially extremely serious disciplinary offences that raised huge issues of law and principle. The case was dealt with as quickly as it could be, given the amount of paper involved. It eventually came before an interlocutory procedure. The nature of the system is that the Bar Council was able to obtain the services of Mr Justice McKinnon, the senior Queen’s Bench judge, to sit and judge this interlocutory procedure. He gave a judgment of magnificent cogency and great detail, upon which he worked extremely hard. I note that my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford is appearing before the same judge at the moment, which I suspect produced the mutterings in front of me just now. I hope he does as well next week.