Hirst earns street cred with IT dig

The Bar Council chairman, Jonathan Hirst QC, has probably taken a fair amount of ribbing for appearing to epitomise the elitist image the modern Bar wants to shed.

He's Eaton and Cambridge educated and the son of a former Bar leader, the appeal court judge, Lord Justice Hirst.

Old school he may be, but humourless he ain't.

In Mr Hirst's speech to fellow barristers at the Bar's annual conference last weekend, the chairman sailed close to the wind on several controversial topics.

He had one complaint with speculative lists of which silks were in the millionaire's club: that he wasn't on it.

Defending the high incomes of some, he triggered sharp intakes of breath by comparing his learned friends with prostitutes: 'Almost every other profession - including doctors and accountants, as well as, no doubt, the oldest profession of all - produces a few very high earners.' But perhaps the most telling line about the modern Bar came when Mr Hirst trumpeted the profession's embrace of IT.

'You have to look quite hard to find a barristers' desk without a networked PC on it,' he said, begging the inference that for a minority at the Bar the initials PC still invoke images of Dixon of Dock Green.