Legal Services Bill [HL]

I declare an interest as a Master of the Bench of the Middle Temple; that is, I am a member of the governing body of my Inn of the Court. In the past, I have acted as chair of the scholarships committee, which has a significant educational role. It is well known that although the four Inns of Court, about which my noble and learned friend Lady Butler-Sloss has spoken, admit people to be student members and in due course may call them to the Bar as junior barristers, they have delegated many of their traditional educational functions to the universities and central bodies, such as the Inns of Court School of Law, for the study of legal subjects and of course the passing of examinations. Nevertheless, I agree with my noble and learned friend Lady Butler-Sloss. The Inns retain a number of key educational functions, including the grant of scholarships and other awards that are vital to making it possible for many students, especially those from poorer families, to undergo their legal education. The Inns also provide well stocked libraries, social opportunities to enable students to meet barristers and judges, mentoring through sponsorship schemes of individual students and, increasingly in recent years, the provision of practical training in advocacy and guidance in obtaining places as pupils with practising barristers. The Inns of Court are also involved with the continuing education of barristers after they have been called to the Bar. Between them, the Inns have, I believe, about 500 volunteer advocacy trainers comprising judges and senior barristers. I support Amendment No. 151 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, which is designed to give formal recognition in the Bill to the role of the Inns of Court in calling to the Bar those who exercise the ““reserved legal activity””, as described in Clause 12, of the exercise of certain rights of audience in the courts. The public interest, with which we are all concerned, and public confidence in high-quality service provided by barristers would be underlined by this formal recognition proposed by Amendment No. 151 of the role of the Inns of Court.