Today is silks day. At a ceremony in Westminster 96 newly-minted King’s Counsel will be appointed. All are barristers: none of the nine solicitors who applied in the most recent competition was successful. Since solicitors were permitted to apply for the award in 1995, only 66 have been appointed out of 231 applicants.
Responding to a feature in the Gazette highlighting allegations that the King’s Counsel appointment process is biased and discriminatory, one solicitor questionsilksed why his colleagues ‘keep trying to get noticed by a body that is predisposed to ignore us’. Ian Ryan, a white-collar crime partner at the firm Howard Kennedy, drew an analogy between solicitors trying to make silk and ‘skiers trying to win an Oscar’.
Ryan took to LinkedIn to suggest that solicitors should have their own mark of excellence, administered by the Law Society and marked by two different letters. He suggested TB – standing for Top Brief, but accepted that it might not cut it with the ‘magic circle’ firms.
Obiter is keen to hear any other suggestions for a solicitors’ quality mark.
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