The legal profession is still capable of coming together as a community

Thursday, 24 May 2012 A great deal is written and said about divisions in the legal profession - on the results of increased specialisation, the disparities in rewards, and the questions of public policy that generate discord. While such differences are real and worthy of note, this week’s London Legal Walk showed that the legal profession is still capable of comi...
London Legal Walk 2012
Comment
Decision to scrap the trainee minimum salary was ill-considered and nonsensical

by Hekim Hannan, chair of the Junior Lawyers Division

Last week the SRA abolished the trainee minimum salary, currently £18,590 in Central London and £16,650 elsewhere.



Letters

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Sole ‘success’

Viv Williams’s recent comments really rubbed salt into a wound which was just beginning to heal.

I set up my practice 25 years ago and operated as a sole practitioner for all of those years, highly successfully. I had a superb, loyal following which resulted in the majority of instructions coming from recommendations from satisfied clients - not customers.



Persistence pays off

Edward Foster suggests it is unfair that so few LPC students secure a training contract and that a three-year postgraduate professional apprenticeship may be the way forward. The abolition of the minimum trainee ‘wage’ agreed last week should also help.



Managing stress

We at LawCare were sorry to read the letter of 10 May from Jean Booth. Sadly her experience of stress leading to debilitating and ultimately career-ending depression is one we hear only too often on the LawCare helpline. We would reiterate Ms Booth’s advice - if you are juggling the many demands of life, don't push yourself too hard. Help is at hand for those who may be struggling.



News blogs

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No win, no fee climb down: a case of double standards
John Hyde
Thursday, 24 May 2012

Is the government losing its nerve on no win, no fee reforms?

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Going ‘no comment’: a delicate balancing act
Catherine Baksi
Thursday, 24 May 2012

Sam Hallam’s conviction for the murder of Essayas Kassahun was overturned last week by the Court of Appeal, after he had spent seven years in jail.

Barrister Henry Blaxland QC said Hallam, who was 18 when sentenced, had been the victim of a miscarriage of justice brought about by a combination of ‘manifestly unreliable identification evidence’, a ‘failure by police properly to investigate his alibi’ and ‘non-disclosure by the prosecution of material that could have supported his case’.

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One out, all out
Catherine Baksi
Friday, 18 May 2012

The warning by Criminal Bar Association chair Max Hill QC today that barristers are prepared to strike - backed by a survey showing near unanimous outrage - is a watershed moment.

Hill notes barristers’ reluctance to use their ‘ultimate weapon’, namely ‘stopping the courts’, to make their point, but perhaps that is what it will take before the government will listen.

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