Tensions are rising over unpopular proposals for flexible hours in court, despite a senior judge’s attempts to reassure practitioners
Pilots at six courts are planned, with the courts staying open late and judges and staff working in shifts. However, lawyers fear the late hours and unpredictability of timings will wreak havoc on their lives.
Writing in his capacity as ‘judge in charge of reform’, Lord Justice Fulford issued ‘clarifying comments’ at the end of July.
Fulford LJ said he wanted to ‘demystify’ the proposed flexible operating hours pilots, and regretted ‘the extent of the widely-broadcast misunderstandings and ill-informed comments from a range of sources’. He said: ‘These are pilots—no more, no less. If the ideas they explore do not pass muster, then they will fade into history.’
In a tersely-worded response this week, however, Andrew Langdon QC, chairman of the Bar Council notes that the misunderstandings and ill-informed comments were ‘understandable, given that there was no consultation paper setting out the proposals in any detail, and they have been developed in a somewhat piecemeal fashion’.
He points out that barristers are in a better position to understand the impact of shifts in court than anyone employed by HMCTS and asks that their concerns be addressed. Despite repeated requests to HMCTS, he says he has not been provided with the evaluation criteria and therefore is not able to be reassured that it will adequately measure the consequences barristers fear. Moreover, he says there is doubt that the criteria will be available before the first pilot commences in Newcastle.
Langdon warns that the pilot may be distorted by ‘sympathetic listing’, excluding cases where parties object. He reiterates concerns that barristers with caring responsibilities, who are mainly women, will be adversely affected.
He concludes: ‘I hope you did not mean implicitly or otherwise to criticise the Bar Council, or for that matter the CBA [Criminal Bar Association], in raising these concerns, and doing so vocally and vehemently.
‘I wonder if, on reflection, you would be prepared, publicly, to make it clear that you did not mean to suggest that the Bar Leaders who have been grappling with this had been ill-informed or misunderstood?’
