In the runup to the general election both political parties should take a leaf from Margaret Thatcher’s 1979 pledge on the justice system, the new chair of the bar said last night. 'Mrs Thatcher recognised, when she increased police officer salaries by around 45%, that an effective justice system relies on appropriately remunerating those responsible for its operation,' Sam Townend KC told an audience at Lincoln’s Inn.

The construction and engineering silk went on to call for increases in public funded fees adding up to £46 million over the next five years. 

In a wide-ranging inaugural address, the leader of England and Wales’ 17,000 barristers cited numerous examples of a justice system on the edge of collapse. One focus was on the collapse in the number of guilty pleas being entered at first hearing. In 2014, 84% of defendants pleaded guilty at first hearing; last year the figure was 36%. 'What we are witnessing is a breakdown of the compact essential to any effective criminal justice system governed by the rule of law,' Townend said.

Such a breakdown 'will put the criminal courts system, already running at close to boiling point, under unbearable pressure,' he said. 

Sam Townend makes inaugural address

Townend called for investment in justice and warned of the collapse in early guilty pleas

Source: Michael Cross

In the family courts, Townend highlighted a lack of political will to resolve 'a chronic decline' in the system’s effectiveness. Of the move towards compulsory mediation - 'something of an oxymoron' - he said the government should offer funding for legal advice on top of the £500 mediation voucher. 

Townend also warned of the consequences of attacks on lawyers for doing their job. In a reference to current press criticism of Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, he said: 'It is not appropriate to trawl through a barrister’s case history to pick out unsympathetic clients or causes that they have acted for and to hold them responsible for the outcome of a given case.’

'Some public words by leading Conservative and Labour lawyer politicians to deprecate such attacks and to help to explain the role of lawyers would be extremely welcome,' he added.

Turning to legal regulation, Townend cloaked an olive branch to the Bar Standards Board which 'appears to have turned the corner on performance' with continuing concern about its cost. He described the BSB as an 'outlier', charging £684 a year 'compared to the per solicitor cost of £436'. 

Townend also indicated that the Bar Council would continue to press for change in the timing of call to the bar, pointing to the public confusion about who is entitled to call themselves a barrister and the 'unfair' regulation burden falling on the minority of practising barristers. Meanwhile, he said, 'the availability of call to the bar gives false encouragement to those who have little prospect of obtaining a pupillage'.