LEGAL DIRECTIONS – JUDGE’S HANDOUT

My jobs –

1. To explain to you the law which applies in this case.

I am responsible for decisions about what legal rules you have to follow.
All of my directions about the law, set out in this document, are compulsory for you to follow – you have no choice.  If I get them wrong they can be corrected by an appeal.

• To remind you of the core parts of the evidence to help you remember what witnesses have said, but you are the assessors of the evidence, not me.  I will do that after you have heard the closing speeches of the advocates in the case.

Your jobs –

1. Appoint someone to chair your discussions.  Choose someone in any way you want.  That person should ensure everyone is given the opportunity of expressing their views and everyone listens respectfully to each other.  The person you choose to chair your discussions doesn’t have any special status – you are all equally important – you each have one vote.  When you have made up your minds one of you will need to act as your spokesperson and answer a series of questions from the court clerk to tell us what verdicts you have reached.

• Make the necessary decisions about the facts of this case, as a group of the 12 of you together, in order to come to your agreed verdicts of either ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’.  Here are some guidelines about how to approach your task
• Assess what witnesses have said and assess the other material placed before you so as to decide what facts have been proved.
• You are the only judges of the evidence. 
• Throughout your discussions as a jury you have to decide on the facts of the case.  That’s not for me, nor anyone else.
• Respect each others’ opinions and value the different viewpoints you each bring to the case.
• Be fair and give everyone a chance to speak.
• It is okay to change your mind.
• Listen to one another. 
• Do not be afraid to speak up and express your views
• Do not let yourself be pressured into changing your opinion, and do not pressure anyone else.
• Do not rush into a verdict to save time.  Everyone involved in this case deserves your attention and thoughtful consideration.
• Do not under any circumstances make your own inquiries about anything to do with the case (as explained in the handout “Your Legal Responsibilities as a Juror” that you received on the first day of the trial).
• If someone is not following the instructions in this document, or refuses to engage, or relies on other information outside of the evidence presented to you then you must let me know by sending me a note straight away.
• You can vote on where you have all got to in your views at any stage of your discussions.
• You can take votes by raising your hands or by writing it down – that is up to you.

• Your verdicts have to be unanimous: 12-0 decisions.  (If the time were to come when I could accept any verdict from you involving fewer votes than 12 in favour of it you must wait until I call you back into court and tell you about it.)

Who has the job of proving the facts of the case?

The Prosecution has brought the case to court, so
the Prosecution has the burden of proving its allegations.

A Defendant does not have to prove anything or disprove anything.

How is something ‘proved’?

Something is proved if, and only if, you are sure about it in the light of all of the evidence you have heard on that topic.

If, in the light of all of the evidence on that topic, you are not sure about it, then it hasn’t been proved.

Separate verdicts

There are four Defendants and so there are four verdicts of ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’ you have to reach. 

You must examine the evidence in relation to each Defendant – one by one, reaching a separate verdict on each, based upon your analysis of the evidence against each of them. 

Your verdicts may well all be the same, but they might be different.   
It all depends on your view of the evidence against each.

What is it that has to be proved by the Prosecution for ‘Criminal Damage’?

The indictment charges contain a number of separate ingredients, all of which the Prosecution must prove before you can convict a Defendant. 

The Prosecution has to prove all of the following against a Defendant (D) before you may find him/her guilty of causing criminal damage:-

1)         D, jointly and together with others

2)         damaged property;

3)         the property belonged to another;

4)         D intended to damage it, or was reckless as to whether it would be  damaged; and

5)         D did not have a lawful excuse for damaging it.

We are going to examine each of those five ingredients in a little more detail:-

1. The prosecution alleges that the Defendants acted “jointly and together with others”.
   The law is that a person may be guilty of a crime either by carrying it out themselves, or, if they intended that the crime should be committed, by deliberately assisting or encouraging or causing it to be committed, even if it is actually carried out by others. 

A Defendant in this case may therefore be guilty, even if they did not personally cause damage to the statue, if they deliberately assisted/encouraged/caused others to damage it by providing ropes or by attaching ropes to the statue, intending to assist others to intentionally or recklessly cause damage to the statue.

• Property is “damaged” if it is temporarily or permanently physically harmed.  Whether you are sure there was physical harm to the statue or not (which is a question of fact and degree) is a question for you to decide on the evidence which you have heard. 
  
  
• Property is to be treated as “belonging” to those who have custody or control of it and to those who have any proprietary right or interest in it.  The Prosecution case is that the statue was maintained by Bristol City Council and held in trust on behalf of the people of Bristol.  The Defendants have not suggested that the statue belonged exclusively to one or more of them – they do not dispute that it “belonged to another”.     
• “Intending to damage the statue, or being reckless as to whether it would be damaged.”  ‘Intending’ is a straightforward word which needs no further definition.         
  D would have acted ‘recklessly’ as to whether the statue was damaged if D was aware of a risk that damage would occur and it was, in the circumstances known to D, unreasonable to take the risk.  If D was unaware of a risk that damage would occur then D could not have been reckless.          
  
  
• It is for the Prosecution to disprove that a Defendant had a “lawful excuse” for damaging someone else’s property.
  In this case it is being argued that a D had one (or more) lawful excuses. 
  You will have to examine the lawful excuses set out below and decide if the Prosecution has disproved them.
  • The use of reasonable force to prevent a crime.          
       A person is to be treated as having a lawful excuse if:-

(1)  they used such force as was reasonable in the circumstances as they believed     them to be      
(2)  in the prevention of a crime.

(3) When they gave evidence you may consider that the Ds were saying they used force to prevent the following crimes:

• the public display of indecent matter
• the display of a visible representation which is abusive, within the sight of a person likely to be caused distress by it.

I will explain a little more about each of those three parts of this lawful excuse which is relied upon by the Defendants, but I will do so in reverse order: (3), (2) & then (1), because that will make it easier to understand.

• May D have genuinely/honestly believed that a factual situation existed which amounts to a criminal offence (even if D’s belief was a mistaken one)?
• There is a criminal offence of displaying indecent matter publicly.      
  May D have genuinely/honestly believed Bristol City Council was displaying ‘indecent matter’ in public with this statue on the Centre?      
  The definition of ‘indecent’ in the Oxford English Dictionary includes: “unbecoming; highly unsuitable or inappropriate; in extremely bad taste; unseemly; offending against the recognized standards of propriety and delicacy; highly indelicate…”
• There is a criminal offence of displaying a visible representation which is abusive, within the sight of a person likely to be caused distress by it.      
  May D have genuinely/honestly believed that Bristol City Council was committing that crime by displaying an abusive statue, where one or more people were likely to have been caused distress by it? 

The Defence argue that they genuinely/honestly believed that a factual situation existed which amounts to these criminal offences being committed by the Council.    
The Prosecution argues that no criminal offence was being committed at all by the display of this statue – it was neither ‘indecent’ nor ‘abusive’, and you can be sure that the Ds did not genuinely/honestly believe a factual situation existed which would have amounted to these crimes. 

If you decide that D may have genuinely/honestly believed that a factual situation existed which amounts to these criminal offences, you need to go on to examine the following. 

(2)      Were D’s actions carried out in order to prevent what they honestly/genuinely (even if mistakenly) believed to be a crime?      
The Defendants argue that that is what they were doing – their actions were done in order to prevent one or both of those crimes, which they honestly/genuinely believed to be happening.             
The Prosecution argues that they were not trying to achieve that, but instead were trying to force their own agenda because they were frustrated by the lack of progress in the debate about the statue. 

• Did D use ‘reasonable’ force to prevent a crime, in the circumstances as they believed them to be?       
  It is for you to decide what force was reasonable by your own standards.  It is not what D thinks was reasonable – it’s what you think was reasonable.    

However, the ‘circumstances’ in which force was used are the circumstances as D believed them to be.         

If D only did what they honestly and instinctively thought was necessary to prevent a crime, then that would be strong evidence that reasonable action was taken.         
In the case of the first 3 Defendants, did each of them honestly and instinctively think it was necessary to play a part in pulling down the statue to prevent a crime?     
In the case of the fourth Defendant, did he honestly and instinctively think it was necessary to help roll the statue all the way to Pero’s bridge to prevent a crime?               
The Prosecution says that even if you were to conclude Bristol City Council may have been committing one or both of the crimes now alleged (which is disputed), and even if you were to conclude the Defendants honestly (even if mistakenly) took the action they did to prevent one or more of those crimes,

it was unreasonable, in the circumstances as Ds believed them to be, to use force like this to prevent it, because there was a process through which concerns about the statue could have been dealt.
The Defendants argue that their actions were reasonable because any such processes had failed.

(ii)   Belief in the consent of the owners        
A person is to be treated as having a lawful excuse if he/she honestly believed,
at the time of the acts alleged to constitute the offence,            
that those who the person honestly believed were entitled to consent to the damage,            
would have consented to it,       
if they had known of the damage and its circumstances.          
(It does not matter if the person’s beliefs were justified or not, as long as they were honestly held.)             

       Neither Milo Ponsford nor Sage Willoughby have presented evidence that could form the basis of an argument that they had this lawful excuse.    

Rhian Graham and Jake Skuse have given evidence to the effect that they had this lawful excuse for their actions, saying that on 7 June 2020 they honestly believed the statue was owned by the people of Bristol and honestly believed that, had the people of Bristol known of the damage and its circumstances, they would have consented to what was done.        
The Prosecution argues that there is no way that they could possibly have honestly believed that the people of Bristol would have consented to what they did because they didn’t take any steps to find out.             
If you consider that this lawful excuse applied, or may have applied, in the case of either of those two Defendants, then the Prosecution would have failed to disprove it and you will find that Defendant ‘not guilty’.

(iii)   The final lawful excuse you have to consider concerns all four defendants (and, again, the Prosecution has the burden of disproving it).  However, I am going to deal with it under a separate bold heading:-  

Would convicting D be a disproportionate interference with his/her rights?

Courts must read and give effect to legislation such as the Criminal Damage Act in a manner which is compatible with a number of rights which we all have.  

Two of those rights are:

• the right to freedom of thought and conscience and to manifest one’s beliefs;
• the right to freedom of expression, including to hold opinions and impart ideas.

These rights protect not only beliefs, such as anti-racism, and speech itself, but also actions associated with protest.  Even where those actions have more than a minimal impact on the rights of other people, they need not result in a conviction.  It is all a matter of fact and degree.  

Limitations on these rights are permitted under laws like the Criminal Damage Act if they are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

It requires balancing the defendants’ rights to freedom of conscience and belief, to freedom of expression and to protest, as against the interests of public safety and the protection of the rights and freedoms of others, such as the property rights of the Council.

The Ds will argue that even if you reject all of their other arguments, if you were to convict them it would be a disproportionate interference with them exercising those rights.

You will therefore have to decide if the Prosecution made you sure that convicting them of criminal damage would be a proportionate interference with them exercising those rights.     

Even if you are sure that all the other elements of the crime of criminal damage are made out and that no other lawful excuse applies, you must go on to consider whether it is necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of public safety or for the protection of the rights of others, that the defendants should be convicted for their actions.    
Another way of looking at that question is to ask whether the interference in the defendants’ rights, which a conviction for the offence of criminal damage would cause, is proportionate in all the circumstances, including the individual actions of each D.

It is your task to make an assessment of where the balance lies, having regard to all the facts in the case.

In considering whether a conviction would be disproportionate for any D, the question for you is not whether you agree with their actions or their aims, nor is it about sympathy or whether you think they are likeable.  Everyone in the country has these rights and we each enjoy identical protection of those rights.  This means that people with whom we fundamentally disagree have exactly the same protection as those with whom we agree.

When examining the facts of this case and deciding whether you are sure it would be
proportionate to convict a Defendant, you may wish to consider the following factors.  The list is not intended to be exhaustive and you are not obliged to consider any individual factor if you do not consider it to be helpful in reaching your verdict.  It is also up to you what weight to give the factors you consider helpful.

• The extent of the interference with the rights of others, notably the rights of Bristol City Council and of other Bristolians on whose behalf they held this statue in trust.
• Whether the Defendant believed in the views which motivated their actions.
• Whether those views relate to very important issues.
• The importance to the Defendant of the method of protest adopted.
• Whether the actions of the Defendant was  directly aimed at the matter of which they disapproved.
• Whether the Defendant’s actions presented a danger to public safety. 

‘No comment’ interviews

The words of the police ‘caution’ are: “You do not have to say anything.            
But, it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”

As it says, it is a suspect’s right not to answer police questions, but there is also a warning that there might be damaging consequences if they do not mention something when questioned which they later rely on in court. 

Two of the accused – Milo Ponsford and Jake Skuse, declined to answer any police questions.  
When the Prosecution asked Milo Ponsford and Jake Skuse why, they both told you they acted on the basis of advice from a Solicitor’s representative.  
They each acknowledged it was their own choice to decide whether or not to answer the police questions and face any consequences from a decision not to.  They do not accept that the real reason behind their decisions not to answer questions was because they had not yet had time to think up answers which might provide them with the basis of a defence that they might be able to rely upon if they were charged with criminal damage.

They have now given you detailed accounts from the witness box.  I will summarise their evidence in due course, but they were both asked: whether they had any lawful excuse for damaging it.  Both replied “no comment”.  They have now put forward accounts from the witness box, during the course of which they have said they did have lawful excuses for what they did.

Could they have reasonably been expected to set out what lawful excuses they now rely upon to the police when asked about the allegation in their interviews back in 2020?  Why didn’t they answer the questions with the answers they have now given to you in court? 

You must consider their explanations for that.  They have each told you the real reason was because they took the advice they were given by a legal adviser.  If you accept that may have been the real reason behind their decision to remain silent, then take this matter no further, don’t hold it against them.

However, if you are sure that the real reason for keeping silent was that that Defendant didn’t have an answer to those questions and was giving himself time to make-up answers later to support a defence to the allegation, then you are entitled to hold their silence at the police station against them and treat the things they have said from the witness box as having less weight. 

You should only reach that conclusion if the prosecution case was so strong as to call for an answer and you think it is fair and proper to do so.  You must not convict that defendant wholly, or mainly, on the basis of this point – it is just one of the factors which may feature in your assessment of all of the evidence in the case.

Sage Willoughby and Rhian Graham, on the other hand, answered many of the police questions and explained what motivated their actions.  Do not hold it against them that they did not answer some police questions, because those questions have no bearing upon your assessment of whether they are guilty or whether any of the others are guilty.

Expert evidence

In this case you have heard the evidence of Professor Olusoga, who has been called on behalf of Sage Willoughby.  Expert evidence is permitted in a criminal trial to provide you with information and opinion, within the witnesses expertise, which is likely to be outside your knowledge.  You should look at it in its proper perspective – it is just part of the evidence as a whole to which you may have regard on one particular aspect of the case, namely if you think it helps you assess the question of whether displaying a monument of Edward Colston may be indecent or abusive.  You are entitled to have regard to the historical information he has researched and interpreted when coming to your own conclusions.  Bear in mind, however, that if, having given the matter careful consideration, you do not accept any parts of his evidence, or do not think it helps you answer the questions you have to answer, then you do not have to act upon it.  It is for you to decide what evidence you consider relevant, what evidence you accept and what evidence you reject.

The relevance of the first three Defendants having no previous convictions

You should consider this in 2 different ways:

a)    It is relevant to your assessment of their credibility as witnesses.  Someone with previous criminal convictions might be considered less likely to be a truthful witness.  Because they have not got criminal records you should take that into account in considering whether they are therefore more likely to have been truthful to you.

b)    Would someone who has reached their ages without a criminal record have started offending now?  It is relevant to your assessment of them because it may support the argument that they are not the sort of people who have a tendency to be law breakers. 

These are not defences, because obviously no one would otherwise ever be convicted for a first time if they could rely on these two points as an answer to an allegation.  You must take them into account, but it is for you to decide how much weight you give them. 

Comments

The Prosecution and Defence barristers will make comments to you in their speeches, seeking to convince you of the strengths of elements in their cases and weaknesses in the other side’s case. 

If those comments and arguments help you then please take them into account in your own thinking about the evidence, but you have to decide this case on the basis of your assessment of the evidence and not on the basis of anyone else’s. 

It is possible that you may sense that I have a view about some parts of the evidence.  I do not intend to influence your views one way or the other and I don’t intend to do so in this summing-up. You alone are the judges of the facts.

Evidence

What I will do is to pick out what I think may be the most useful and relevant parts of my notes to remind you of the evidence.

Because you are the judges of the evidence, not me, take no notice of any things I remind you about which you think are irrelevant.
Equally, if you remember things which I do not mention, pay attention to what you recall.

Final practical points

Don’t suffer in silence – if you need to be reminded of any of the evidence that has been given (remembering there cannot be any further evidence presented to you), or you need me to explain some part of the law more clearly, just send me a note and I will do what I can to help. 

If some of you need the occasional break for a smoke then arrangements will be made for that.

Take all your papers with you when you go out to decide on your verdicts.  There is no time pressure on you.  If you are still discussing the evidence at around 4:30 and have not reached your verdicts I will have you back into court then and send you home overnight with some further legal directions.  We will then resume again the next morning.

Thank you for inviting me to speak – in the best traditions of these things, this event created online controversy before it even started

Twitter users questioned fee for an online event on the future of hard-pressed legal aid lawyers – a fee I’m told it would take junior legal aid at least three days to earn.

I’m told by organisers there are free and reduced priced tickets.

I’ve been asked to speak on the state of legal aid – I’d like to thank the Legal Practitioners Group, the Legal Action group, Law centres network, Support through Court, the Bar Council and the Criminal Bar Association and Inquest for their help in preparing this

I want to focus on the people who need help from legal aid

The Westminster Inquiry into legal aid heard powerful testimony last month from three individuals helped by legal aid – but only after all had put up a fight to get the funding – or at least some of it.

Angela Pownall, whose son Arian Jennings became acutely mentally unwell and took his life, was put in touch with a solicitor through the charity Inquest, to represent her at the inquest into her son’s death.

Greater Manchester Police, Penine Care and the Acute Trust, were all represented by barristers.

Two days before the 9-day inquest, Angela was told that the legal aid application had not been processed, which meant the barrister would not be able to attend the inquest.

It took a nudge from the coroner, the LAA part-funded her representation. To fund the rest, Angela had to use money that she had borrowed from a family member – money she had intended to use to fund her son’s funeral.

Without a lawyer and facing the legal teams for the hospitals and the police, all seeking to protect their own reputations rather than find out what had gone wrong with her son’s care, Angela would not have been able to deal with the inquest – grieving for her son, and when there were some days she could not shower.

She quite reasonably asked whether anyone would have been able to go to court and hear about their child’s autopsy and last moments, and then been able to ask questions of the witnesses.

Pam Coughlan was very seriously injured in a road accident. She and 11 other disabled residents of a large NHS house were promised a ‘home for life’ if they moved to a brand new state of the art NHS facility.

Her care was provided by the NHS until, in the 1990s, the North and East Devon Health Authority tried to transfer responsibility for her care to Social Services – which would have meant she and all the other residents had to move, and have to pay for their won social care.

With the help of legal aid lawyer, Nicola Mackintosh, she brought a judicial review case, which enabled her to stay in her home and established nursing care was health care and not the responsibility of social services.

Stephen Tyler is a physically disabled man with three small children who became wheelchair bound. His family were evicted from their private rented accommodation having asked for reasonable adjustments to be made to accommodate Stephen’s disability.

Despite offers of temporary accommodation by Birmingham City Council, the family found themselves homeless. Stephen’s wife and children were able to stay with her family, but because of his wheelchair Stephen was unable to access the property and had to sleep in his car.

The family looked for private accommodation to rent but were rejected again and again because landlords did not want to accept housing benefits.

With the involvement of rose Arnall, a lawyer at Shelter, Stephen brought a case against one of the estate agents that discriminated against him on account of his benefits

All of these people have had to fight for funding – at extremently stressful times in the lives

Without expert lawyers they would have been unable to achieve the outcomes that they did.

These are some of the people who have been helped by legal aid. Because legal aid is about people.

People who need legal aid, do not chose to have legal problems – a mother does not chose to have to try to find out what went wrong with his dead son’s care, people do not chose to have to fight for a roof over their head or to have their care needs met.

Many who find themselves in need of legal help are there because they have been let down by the state or others – their children have not been given the support they need for their schooling and development, the DWP have incorrectly stopped their benefits, which also leads to issues with their tenancy and may lead to them facing eviction.

All to often the legal aid debate is framed solely around lawyers fees – with the government and its ministers cynically and unfairly casting aspurtians on these fat-cat, do-good, lefty, actist lega aid lawyers.

They do not and would not dare to make the same attack on nurses, doctors and teachers – you do not hear them talking about nurses intervening at the last minute to save lives, or teachers doing all they can to help children pass their exams.

So why attack lawyer who intervene to help people?

But, believe it or not – those three people – Angela,  Pam and Stephen are the fortunate ones – hundreds of thousands of people are denied legal aid due to cuts intorduced by the LASPO, which removed many areas of law from public funding.

Most social welfare law (education, employment, debt, housing, immigration and welfare benefits) and private law children and family cases are now out of scope.

Even where areas of law are still covered, people have to be pretty much destitute to get legal aid – under the means test that has not been updated for years

This has forced more people into a situation where, if they wish to access justice, they must do so without legal representation.

Some of the most disadvantaged and marginalised members of our society have been hardest hit by the changes. Legal troubles are often compounded by additional disadvantages such as language barriers, and mental or physical disability.

The lack of access to early legal advice often means that cases have become more complicated and urgent by the time they do each lawyers.

Support Through Court — formerly The Personal Support Unit–  a charity that supports people who have to represent themselves in court, says demand for its services have sky-rocketed.

The cuts have created the advice deserts:

Over a third of the population live in local authorities which do not have a single housing legal aid provider

There are just 8 firms in England and wales with a legal aid contract for Special educational needs cases

They have also caused widespread miscarriages of justice, the draining of the talent pool of future lawyers and judges as young people increasingly choose a career away from legal aid and burn out among who are left due to year of financial stress and emotional pressure.

If you want me to talk about money, instead of people I’m happy to do that.

I attended a virtual event the other day – I think it was during the LAPG conference – the legal aid minister, Alex Chaulk said there needed to be evidence for an increase in legal aid, showing the benefit of early legal advice

For as long as I’ve been a journalist I have written about reports detailing the evidence base for legal aid and the devastating impact of cuts:

The bach commission, the low commission, the PAC, the justice committee, the bar council, the law society, LAPG Justice,

Legal aid for early legal advice saves money

Research by the Legal Action Group has demonstrated that every £1 spent on legal aid advice saves the state £6.

Law Centres calculated that in a single year they add £43m to the economy in keeping people employed, paying taxes etc.

Where there is a political will, money is available. The money for civil legal aid is a small change for Government, it could be doubled, and it would hardly be noticed by the treasury.

In 2010, annual expenditure for the civil and criminal justice system stood at approximately £2bn per annum, which equates to the cost of running the NHS for a fortnight.

Now, it is approximately £1.5bn a year

The government is willing to spend £37bn on track and trace

£849m on eat out to help out – no evidence base required

It is happy to fund lawyers to represent it when it finds itself before the courts — I James Eadie QC works for legal aid rates

in a recent legal challenge over the government’s commissioning of PPE, the government told the court the bill for its lawyers would be £1M

Turning briefly to crime – that can be summed up in short order – cuts, court closures, reduced sitting days – and then cam covid. Not the backlog has reached an all time high with more than 55,000 cases in the crown court, trials listed for 2023 and warnings about miscarriages of justice

What the figures do not convey is the sheer human misery– Cuts to legal aid are literally making people sick – and costing lives.

With the help of Tom at legal cheek – I have created my own Hancock style banner  — which I think may have been displayed while I have been speaking

It is the plea to government of all legal aid lawyers, civil and criminal, and those who need their help – fund legal aid, do justice, save lives.

https://www.westminsterforumprojects.co.uk/agenda/Next-steps-for-Legal-Aid-in-England-and-Wales-2021.pdf

1. Helena Normanton 1949 Dead
2. Rose Heilbron 1949 Second Woman High Ct Judge 1974 Died 2005
3. Dorothy Knight Dix 1957 Dead
4. Elizabeth Lane 1960 County Court Judge then First Woman High Court
Judge (1965). Dead
5. Myrella Cohen 1970 Circuit Judge 1972 Retired 1997 Died 2002
6. Jean Southworth 1973 Recorder 1972-93 Retired. Died 2010
7. Patricia Coles 1974 Circuit Judge Retired Died 2005
8. Barbara Calvert 1975 Chairman Industrial Tribunal 1986 Recorder and
Deputy HCJ FD 1986-1998. Retired Lady Lowry. Died
2015
9. Rosina Hare 1976 Died 2012
10. Margaret Booth 1976 High Court Judge FD 1979 Retired
11. Beryl Cooper 1977 Recorder 1977-1998 Retired. Died 2012
12. Joyanne Bracewell 1978 Circuit Judge 1983 HC Judge 1990 Died 2007
13. Monique Viner 1979 Circuit Judge 1990 retired 1998 Died 2006
14. Mary MacMurray 1979 Circuit Judge 1988 Died 2001
15. Elizabeth Appleby 1979 Deputy HCJ FD 1985. Recorder 1989. First female
treasurer of Lincoln’s Inn (2007) 16. Shirley Ritchie 1979 Circuit Judge 1995 [Anwyl] Retired
17. Carol Ellis 1980 CBE Consultant Editor,Law Reports.Died 2015
18. Margaret Puxon 1982 Recorder 1986-1998 Retired Died 2008
19. Eleanor Frances Platt 1982 Recorder 1982-2004 Deputy HCJ FD 1987-2004
Deputy Chairman NHS Tribunal 1995-2001. Acting
Chairman FLBA 1995.
20. Ann Goddard 1982 Circuit Judge 1993 retired 2008 Died 2011.
21. Helen Grindrod 1982 Recorder 1981-1995. Died 2002
22. Sheila Cameron 1983 Recorder Chancellor Diocese Dean of Arches 2001
23. Diana Cotton 1983 Recorder 1982- Deputy HCJ 1993-Tribunal Judge
Criminal Injuries Compensation Appeal Tribunal
and Mental Health Review Tribunal
24. Ann Curnow 1985 Recorder 1980-Retired 2009 Died 2011
25. Barbara Mills 1986 DPP 1992 Retired 1998. Died 2011
26. Rosalyn Higgins 1986 Professor. First Woman Judge in The Hague.
President of the International Court of Justice
(2006) Dame Grand Cross 2019
27. Janet Smith 1986 High Court Judge 1992 Court of Appeal 2002/3
Retired from CA 2011. Independent Assessor for
Miscarriages of Justice iJune 2011. Dame Janet
Smith Review re Jimmy Saville.
28. Mary Arden 1986 High Court Judge 1993 Court of Appeal 2000. Lady
Mance. Supreme Court October 2018
29. Hilary Heilbron 1987 Deputy High Court Judge Daughter of Rose
Heilbron.
30. Barbara Dohmann 1987 Recorder 1990- Deputy HCJ 1994-Chairman of
Combar 1999-2001
31. Belinda Bucknall 1988 Retired. Sits as Arbitrator. Now a door tenant
32. Ann Mallalieu 1988 Baroness. Recorder 1985-93
33. Hazel Williamson 1988 Chairman ChBA 1994-7 Deputy HCJ 1994-2006
Recorder 1996-2006 Circuit Judge Specialist
Chancery 2006 Retired 2013
34. Heather Hallett 1989 Leader SE Circuit 1995-1997 Vice Chairman of the
Bar 1997 Chairman GCBar 1998 High Court Judge
1999, 2002-05 Senior Presiding Judge Western
Circuit. Court of Appeal 2005. Vice-President of
the Queen’s Bench Division 2011. Vice-President
of the Criminal Division of the Court of
Appeals, 2013
35. Clare Tritton 1988 Retired
36. Mary Hogg 1989 High Court Judge FD 1996 retired 2016
37. Brenda Hale 1989 High Court Judge FD 1994. Lady Justice of Appeal
1999 Lady [Lord] of Appeal in Ordinary 2003-
[First woman to hold this position] Head of
Supreme Court 2017 [First woman]
38. Anna Worrall 1989 Recorder 1987-2004 Retired
39. Elizabeth Lawson 1989 Recorder 1998 Deputy HCJ FD Chairman FLBA 1995-
1997 Retired 2007
40. Elizabeth Gloster 1989 P/t J CA Channel Islands Recorder 1995- 2004
High Court Judge 2004 CA 2013 First woman Judge
of Commercial Court. Court of Appeal 2013 Vice
president Civil Division December 2016 Retired
2018
41. Anne Rafferty 1990 Chairman CBA 1995-7 (First woman chairman) High
Court Judge 2000 CA 2011
42. Genevra Caws 1991 Dead.
43. Louise Godfrey 1991 Recorder 1989-2002 Leader of NE Circuit 2001-02
Died 2002
44. Helena Kennedy 1991 Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws
45. Judith Parker 1991 High Court Judge FD 2008
46. Linda Stern 1991 Circuit Judge 2001 Died 2006
47. Patricia Scotland 1991 Baroness. Government Minister 1999
Attorney General 2007-2010
48. Presiley Baxendale 1992 Retired 2008
49. Nicola Davies 1992 Recorder 1998 HCJ QBD 2010 CA 2018
50. Lindsay Kushner 1992 Circuit Judge 2000 Retired 2017
51. Jean Ritchie 1992 Recorder 1993-2008 Retired 2006
52. Pamela Scriven 1992 Recorder 1996- Acting Chairman FLBA 1999
Chairman 1999-2001 Deputy HCJ
53. Elizabeth Slade 1992 Recorder 1998 Chairman ELBA 1995-7 DHCJ,QBD
54. Hazel Fox 1993 [Lady]. Editor International and Comparative Law
Review. Visiting Lecturer in Law, Oxford
55. Joanna Dodson 1993
56. Susan Edwards 1993
57. Joanna Korner 1993 CH 2004 Recorder 1995- 5 years as Senior
prosecuting Counsel at the Hague International
Criminal Tribunal. Circuit Judge 2012
58. Suzan Matthews 1993 Circuit Judge 2003
59. Susan Hamilton 1993 Circuit Judge 1998
60. Caroline Swift 1994 Recorder 1995- High Court Judge 2005-2015 2017
Head of MPTS
61. Marion Simmons 1994 Recorder 1998-2008 Chair Competition Tribunal.
Died May 2008
62. Sonia Proudman 1994 Recorder 2000 HCJ Chancery Division 2008
63. Joanna Greenberg 1994 Recorder 1995 Circuit Judge 2014
64. Linda Sullivan 1994 Recorder 1990 Circuit Judge 2009
65. Judith Hughes 1994 Circuit Judge 2001
66. Laura Cox 1994 High Ct Judge QBD 2002 Honorary
President of the Association of Women
Barristers. 2013 elected as Vice-President of
the UK Association of Women Judges
67. Judith Jackson 1994
68. Jill Black 1994 High Court Judge FD 1999 CA 2010 Supreme Court
2017
69. Frances Oldham 1994 DHCJ FD Recorder
70. Alison Ball 1995 Recorder 1998
71. Nadine Radford 1995 Recorder 1995
72. Heather Swindells 1995 Recorder 1994 Deputy HCJ 2000, Circuit Judge
2005
73. Rebecca Poulet 1995 Recorder 1995 Senior Circuit Judge 2012
74. Cherie Booth 1995 Recorder 1999
75. Florence Baron 1995 High Court Judge FD 2004 Died 2014
76. Catherine Newman 1995 Recorder 2000 Deputy High Court Judge,
Lieutenant-Bailiff of the Royal Court of
Guernsey
77. Anna Pauffley 1995 High Court Judge FD 2003
78. Sonia Woodley 1996 Recorder 1985
79. Rosamund Horwood-Smart 1996 Recorder 1995
80. Janet Turner 1996 2007 Heads Charity and Education Group at Taylor
Vinters.Solicitors
81. Clare Montgomery 1996 Recorder 2000
82. Mary Vitoria 1997 Editor Patent Reports
83. Sally O’Neill 1997 Recorder 2000 Chairman CBA 2007-8
84. Elizabeth Annabel Walker 1997 Circuit Judge 2001 (HHJ Carr)
85. Sally Smith 1997 Written a book on Marshall Hall 2016
86. Lindsay Boswell 1997 Now a door tenant
87. Jennifer Kershaw 1998 Recorder 2000 Circuit Judge 2005 Died 2012
88. Wendy Joseph 1998 Recorder 1999 Circuit Judge 2007. Senior Circuit
Judge 2012
89. Jane Crowley 1998 Recorder 1995 Deputy HCJ FD 1999-
90. Margaret de Haas 1998 Recorder 1999 Circuit Judge 2003 Senior Circuit
Judge 2012
91. Joan Butler 1998 Circuit Judge 2002
92. Frances Patterson 1998 Recorder 2000 DHCJ QB and Admin Court. HCJ
QBD 2013 Died 2016.
93. Elizabeth Blackburn 1998
94. Patricia Lynch 1998 Recorder 2000 Circuit Judge 2014
95. Julia Macur 1998 Recorder 1999 HCJ FD 2005 CA 2013
96. Linda Dobbs 1998 HCJ QBD 2004 Retired 2013
97. Susanna FitzGerald 1999
98. Adrienne Page 1999 Recorder 1999 Recorder
99. Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel 1999
100. Sally Bradley 1999 Recorder DHCJ Died 2014
101. Eleanor Hamilton 1999 Recorder 2000 HCJ FD 2008 CA 2014 (King LJ)
102. Elizabeth Marsh 1999
103. Eleanor Sharpston 1999 Advocate General European Court of Justice,
Luxembourg, 2006
104. Anesta Weekes 1999 Recorder 1999
105. Kathryn Thirlwall 1999 Recorder 2000 HCJ 2010 CA 2017
106. Juliet Wheldon CB 1999 Treasury Solicitor 2000
107. Vera Baird 2000 MP Solicitor General 2007-10 Made Dame in NY
Honours 2017
108. Beverley Lang 2000 Recorder. HCJ 2011 QBD
109. Ann Cotcher 2000
110. Jane Miller 2000 Circuit Junior 2002 Circuit Judge 2010
111. Rachel Brand 2000 Recorder 2003
112. Sasha Wass 2000 Recorder 1997 Recorder CCC 2008 Serious Fraud
Office Panel 2013
113. Yvonne Coen 2000 Recorder 2000
114. Susan Prevezer 2000 Recorder 2000 DHCJ 2006 co-managing partner of
the QE London office Quinn Emanuel Trial Lawyers
115. Catherine Otton-Goulder 2000 Recorder 2000 DHCJ Also a solicitor
116. Elizabeth Jones 2000 DHCJ Chancery Division
117. Diana Ellis 2001 Recorder 1998 Authorised counsel for
International Criminal Court.
118. Margaret Bowron 2001 Recorder 1996
119. Victoria Sharp 2001 HCJ QB 2009 CA 2013
120. Maura McGowan 2001 Recorder 1996 DHCJ 2010 Vice Chairman of
the Bar 2012 Chairman of the Bar 2013
HCJ 2014 QBD
121. Josephine (Jane) Giret 2001 Died 2016
122. Geraldine Andrews 2001 Recorder 2001 HCJ QBD 2013
123. Anna Guggenheim 2001 2006 Circuit Judge
124. Lucille (Lucy) Stone 2001
125. Vasanti Selvaratnam 2001 Recorder 2000
126. Monica Carrs-Frisk 2001
127. Shan Warnock-Smith 2002
128. Marianna Hildyard 2002 Recorder 1999 DHCJ Circuit Judge 2012
129. Kim Hollis 2002 First female Asian Silk 2016 DPP of
British Virgin Islands
130. Elwen Evans 2002 Recorder 2002
131. Susan Rodway 2002 Deputy Chairman of the NHS Tribunal:
2000–2004
132. Melanie Hall 2002
133. Jane McNeill 2002 Recorder. Employment Tribunal
134. Joanna Glynn 2002 Recorder 2000-2013
135. Finola O’Farrell 2002 HCJ QBD 2016
136. Sarah Asplin 2002 DHCJ Chancery Div. HCJ 2012 CA Autumn
2017
137. Alison Foster 2002 DHCJ Chancery
138. Sarah Munro 2002 Recorder 1996 Circuit Judge 2011
139. Margaret Bickford Smith 2003 Recorder 1997 2012 Chair of CiArb
140. Carey Ann Johnston 2003 Legal Assessor MPTS
141. Sally Cahill 2003 Circuit Judge 2005
142. Judith Rowe 2003 Recorder 2000 DHCJ Fam 2005 Circuit
Judge 2012
143. Lucy Theis 2003 Recorder 1998 Chairman FLBA 2008-2010
HCJ Fam div 2010
144. Jane Humphryes 2003 Recorder 1999
145. Miranda Moore 2003
146. Sally Howes 2003
147. Sue Carr 2003 Chairman Professional Negligence Bar
Association and of the Bar’s Complaints
Committee 2008 HCT J 2013

Under the New Rules in October 2006

148. Jacqueline Anne Perry 2006
149. Janet Claire Bazley 2006 Recorder 2000
150 Susan Elizabeth Jacklin 2006 Recorder 1998 DHCJ 2008m Vice Chairman
FLBA 2012, Chairman 2014-15, Circuit
Judge 2018
151. Deborah Joanna Janet Bangay 2006
152. Lynn Margaret Tayton 2006 Circuit Judge 2011
153. Philippa Mary McAtasney 2006
154. Lorna Gillian Meyer 2006
155. Johanne Erica Delahunty 2006 Recorder 2010
156. Helen Katharine Lucy Malcolm 2006 Recorder 2005
157. Rosemary Elizabeth Jackson 2006 Recorder 2002 Full time mediator and
Conciliator
158. Tania Veronica Griffiths 2006 Recorder 2000
159. Tracy Jane Ayling 2006 Standing Counsel to HMRC (1998 – 2005)
160. Sarah Louise Singleton 2006 Recorder Circuit Judge 2012
161. Heather Rogers 2006 Recorder 2010
162. Amanda Eve Pinto 2006 Recorder 2004
163. June Marion Venters 2006 First Woman Solicitor to be QC.
Recorder
164. Gillian Irving 2006 Part-time Chairman of the Care
Standards Tribunal
165. Christine Katherine Laing 2006 Recorder 2000 member of the Standards
Committee of the Bar Standards Board
166. Sallie Ann Bennett-Jenkins 2006 Recorder 2000
167. Kate Victoria Branigan 2006
168. Rosalind Morag Ellis 2006 Church Commissioner 2019
169. Kanta Shant 2006 Recorder. Circuit Judge 2015
170. Frances Jean Judd 2006 Recorder 2002 DHCJ 2011
171. Heather Jean Williams 2006 part-time Employment Judge and as a
Chair of the Royal Mail’s National
Appeals Panel. DHCJ and Recorder,
Assistant Coroner
172. Louise Mary Blackwell 2006
173. Ingrid Ann Simler 2006 Recorder 2002 HCJ 2013 LJ Appeal 2018
174. Ruth Sara Margaret Henke 2006
175. Stephanie Nicola Barwise 2006
176. Patricia Grace Robertson 2006 Board member Bar Standards Board
January 2010. BSB Vice Chair 2013
177. Jennifer Jane Eady 2006 Recorder 2003
178. Dinah Gwen Lison Rose 2006
179. Nathalie Marie Daniella Lieven 2006 HCJ 2019 FD
180. Lesley Jane Anderson 2006 Recorder 2006 DHCJ Ch. 2008
181. Elisabeth Laing 2008 Recorder 2000
182. Julia Dias 2008 member of the Gibraltar Bar 1994
183. Alison Russell 2008 Recorder 2004
184. Rosalind Coe 2008 Recorder 2003 Circuit Judge 2011
185. Sarah Vaughan Jones 2008 Recorder
186. Deborah Eaton 2008 Recorder 2004
187. Felicity Cullen 2008 CEDR Accredited Mediator
188. Suzanne Goddard 2008 Recorder 2002
189. Nerys Jefford 2008 Recorder 2007 HCJ QBD 2016
190. Johannah Cutts 2008 Recorder 2003 Circuit Judge 2011
191. Susan Grocott 2008 Recorder 2003
192. Sarah Forshaw 2008 SFO Approved Panel of QC’s [2009]
Leader SE Circuit 2012
193. Juliet May 2008 Circuit Judge 2008 HCJ 2015
194. Alison Levitt 2008 Recorder Principal Legal Advisor to the
Director of Public Prosecutions.
Partner Mishcons
195. Karon Monaghan 2008 Deputy High Court Judge
196. Sarah Hannaford 2008 Bar of Northern Ireland, 2015
197. Elspeth Talbot Rice 2008 Bar of the Eastern Caribbean Supreme
Court
198. Helen Davies 2008
199. Chantal-Aimee Doerries 2008 Technology and Construction Bar
Association Chairman 2010 Chairman of
the Bar 2016
200. Caroline Harry-Thomas 2008
201. Daphne Irene Romney 2009 Chairman ELBA
202. Ann Elizabeth Hussey 2009
203. Mary Bernadette O’Rourke 2009
204. Penelope Jane Reed 2009 Recorder 2010 DHCJ
205. Maureen Anne Bacon 2009 Recorder 2002 Circuit Judge 2015
206. Gillian Matthews 2009 Circuit Judge 2010
207. Judith Ann Elizabeth Gill 2009 Solicitor
208. Susan Claire Campbell 2009
209. Raquel Agnello 2009 Deputy Registrar in Bankruptcy &
Companies
210. Jennifer Mary Roberts 2009 Recorder 2014 HCJ FD
211. Christina Caroline Lambert 2009
212. Rachel Langdale 2009
213. Wendy-Jane Tivnan Outhwaite 2009 Retired 2012
214. Joanna Angela Smith 2009
215. Leigh-Ann Maria Mulcahy 2009 DHCJ
216. Isabella Forshall 2010
217. Jane Cross 2010
218. Jane Bewsey 2010
219. Katherine D’Arcy 2010 Died 2010
220. Katharine Holland 2010
221. Susan Evans 2010 Circuit Judge 2011
222. Judith Khan 2010
223. Anuja Dhir 2010 Recorder 2009 Circuit Judge 2012
224. Joanne Wicks 2010
225. Zia Bhaloo 2010
226. Helen Mountfield 2010 Recorder 2010
227. Veronique Buehrlen 2010
228. Claire Blanchard 2010
229. Naomi Ellenbogen 2010
230. Sally Harrison 2010
231. Anne Whyte 2010 DHCJ QBD
232. Michelle Colborne 2010
233. Sioban Healy 2010
234. Jemima Stratford 2010
235. Philippa Whipple 2010 Recorder 2005 HCJudge 2015
236. Kalyani Kaul 2011 Recorder, Circuit Judge 2015
237. Catherine Wood 2011 Recorder 2007
238. Barbara Connolly 2011
239. Fiona Barton 2011
240. Kate Davidson 2011
241. Tina Cook 2011
242. Gillian Etherton 2011
243. Sarah Plaschkes 2011 Recorder 2004 Circuit Judge 2015
244. Patricia Hitchcock 2011
245. Sarah Morgan 2011 Recorder 2009/11
246. Rosina Cottage 2011 Recorder 2012
247. Poonam Melwani 2011
248. Eleanor Grey 2011 Judge of the Mental Health Review
Tribunal
249. Eleanor Laws 2011 Recorder
250. Sara Cockerill 2011 DHCJ 2016 HCT J 2017
251. Lisa Giovanetti 2011
252. Janine Kirsty Brimelow 2011 Chairwoman of the Bar Human Rights
Committee of England and Wales 2012-2018
253. Phillippa Kaufmann 2011 Chair of the Mental Disability Advocacy
Centre
254. Jennifer (Jenni) Richards 2011
255. Amanda Tipples 2011 Recorder 2010
256. Amanda Yip 2011 Recorder 2009 DHCJ 2013
257. Alexandra Healy 2011 Recorder 2010
258. Judith Farbey 2011 Lead Assistant Boundary Commissioner
for the London Region 2011
259. Fiona Parkin 2011
260. Gwyneth Knowles 2011 Part-time Tribunal Judge of the Mental
Health Review Tribunal HCJ 2017
261. Sonia Tolaney 2011
262. Felicity Toube 2011
263. Ceri Bryant 2012
264. Frances Heaton 2012 Recorder 2002 DHCJ 2013
265. Suzanne Ormsby 2012
266. Sally Ann Hales 2012 Recorder 2011
267. Anne Studd 2012
268. Jane Bickerstaff 2012
269.Fenella Morris 2012
270. Zoe Johnson 2012 Recorder 2009 Senior Treasury Counsel
at the Central Criminal Court 2011
271. Tracey Angus 2012
272. Dominique Rawley 2012
273. Suzanne McKie 2012 former Chair of the Employment Lawyers
Association
274. Taryn Lee 2012 Recorder 2008
275. Kate Blackwell 2012
276. Samantha Leek 2012
277. Emma Himsworth 2012
278. Sara Masters 2012
279. Rebecca Sabben-Clare 2012
280. Rebecca Stubbs 2012
281. Rebecca Trowler 2012
282. Marie Demetriou 2012
283. Nicola Shaw 2012
284. Anneliese Day 2012
285. Claire Wills-Goldingham 2012
286. Caroline Harrison 2013
287. (Brie)Michelle Stevens-Hoare 2013
288. Sally Hatfield 2013 Recorder 2004 Assistant Deputy Coroner
(Manchester) 2008
289. Fiona Sinclair 2013
290. Parmjit Kaur (Bobbie) Cheema-Grubb 2013 Deputy High Court judge and a
Crown Court Recorder with Appeals
and Rape authorisations Senior
Treasury Counsel. HCJ 2015
291. Karyl Nairn 2013 global co-head of Skadden’s
International Litigation and Arbitration
292. Stephanie Harrison 2013 Legal Counsel to the Equality
and Human Rights Commission (EHRC)

293. Fionnuala McCredie 2013
294. Jessica Simor 2013
295. Kristina Montgomery 2013 Circuit Judge 2014
296. Katherine (Kassie) Smith 2013
297. Camilla Bingham 2013
298. Lucy Frazer 2013 Conservative MP for South East
Cambridgeshire elected 2015
299. Elizabeth Isaacs 2013 Recorder 2009/12 DHCJ FD 2016
300. Rachell Ansell 2014
301. Kelyn Bacon 2014
302. Sarah Elliott 2014
303. Jane Mulcahy 2014
304. Felicity Gerry 2014
305. Catherine Gibaud 2014
306. Annette Henry 2014 Mental Health Review Tribunal (Part-time
judge) 2001 – 2013
307. Paula Hodges 2014 Solicitor Herbert Smith HEAD OF GLOBAL
ARBITRATION PRACTICE
308. Adrienne Lucking 2014 Circuit Judge 2015
309. Kate Markus 2014 Upper Tribunal Judge 2014
310. Charlotte May 2014
311. Elizabeth McGrath 2014
312. Kate Gallafent 2014
313. Saira Sheikh 2014
314. Kathryn Skellorn 2014
315. Karen Steyn 2014 DHCJ 2016
316. Sarah Whitehouse 2014 Senior Treasury Counsel 2014
317. Lisa Wilding 2014
318. Marion Smith 2015
319. Rufina (Aswni)Weereratne 2015
320. Marcia Shekerdemian 2015 Deputy Registrar in the Bankruptcy and
Companies Courts.

321. Julia Cheetham 2015 Recorder 2008
322. Christine Agnew 2015
323. Janet Bignell 2015 Recorder 2009/13/15
324. Annabel Darlow 2015 Recorder 2009
325. Amanda Hardy 2015
326. Rhiannon Jones 2015
327. Jane Lemon 2015
328. Zoe O’Sullivan 2015
329. Alison Pople 2015
330. Lisa Roberts 2015
331. Rachel Crasnow 2015
332. Nageena Khalique 2015
333. Clare Stanley 2015
334. Wendy Miles 2015
335. Riel Karmy-Jones 2015
336. Angela Rafferty 2015
337. Francesca Wiley 2015
338. Catherine Brunner 2015
339. Eleanor Hill 2015 Assistant Coroner London South
340. Deirdre Fottrell 2015 DHCJ 2018
341. Alison Grief 2015
342. Christine Henson 2015 Circuit Judge 2015
343. Jayne Adams 2016
344. Kim Franklin 2016
345. Marina Wheeler 2016
346. Sarah Lee 2016
347. Cathryn McGahey 2016
348. Kerry Bretherton 2016
349. Emma Deacon 2016
350. Katharine Gollop 2016
351. Justine Thornton 2016
352. Caroline Shea 2016
353. Soibhan Grey 2016
354. Loiuise Sweet 2016
355. Gemma White 2016
356. Catrin Evans 2016
357. Clodagh Bradley 2016
358. Bridget Dolan 2016
359. Kama Melly 2016
360. Clare Sibson 2016
361. Hannah Markham 2016
362. Anya Proops 2016
363. Rosalind Phelps 2016
364. Maya Lester 2016
365. Lisa Busch 2016
366. Shaheed Fatima 2016
367. Penelope Madden 2016 Solicitor
368. Jane Allison Hunter 2017
369. Caroline Goodwin 2017 Recorder 2010
370. Sara Lawson 2017
371. Mary Prior 2017 Recorder 2018
372. Alexis Campbell 2017 Recorder 2010
373. Penelope Howe 2017
374. Maria Kinsler 2017
375. Hannah Brown 2017
376. Tana Adkin 2017
377. Kate Bex 2017
378. Natasha Wong 2017
379. Sarah Clarke 2017 Recorder
380. Anna McKenna 2017
381. Caroline Carberry 2017
382. Nina Goolamali 2017
383. Debra Powell 2017
384. Gillian Jones 2017 Recorder 2012
385. Sadeqa Shaheen Rahman 2017
386. Fiona Scolding 2017
387. Anna Vigars 2017 Recorder
388. Diane Middleton 2017
389. Samantha Broadfoot 2017
390. Deok Joo Rhee 2017
391. Catherine Addy 2017
392. Kate Grange 2017
393. Schona Jolly 2017
394. Serena Cheng 2017
395. Alison Macdonald 2017
396. Michelle Heeley 2017 Recorder
397. Sarah Ford 2017
398. Caoilfhionn Gallagher 2017
399. Gemma Mary Taylor 2018
400. Bridget Ann Lucas 2018
401. (Sarah)Vanessa Meachin 2018
402. Samantha Leonie King 2018
403. Clare Catherine Wade 2018
404. Sonali Naik 2018
405. Alison Padfield 2018
406. Jennifer Dempster 2018
407. Heidi Kubik 2018 Recorder 2015 Circuit Judge 2018
408. Kate Lumsdon 2018
409. Nicola Jane Rushton 2018
410. Vanessa Marshall 2018
411. Sarah Lambert 2018 Recorder 2012 Deputy Costs Judge
412. Philippa Hopkins 2018
413. Caroline Rees 2018 Recorder 2016
414. Eloise Marshall 2018
415. Katy Thorne 2018
416.Nicole Sandells 2018
417. Mary Loram 2018 Recorder
418. Amanda Weston 2018
419. Samantha Knights 2018
420. Lynne McCafferty 2018
421. Tiffany Scott 2018
422. Sophie Lamb 2018 Solicitor
423. Sarah Crowther 2018
424. Catherine Callaghan 2018 also qualified in NZ
425. Lyndsey de Mestre 2018
426. Caroline Haughey 2018
427. Lucy Garrett 2018
428. Brenda Campbell 2018
429. Joanna Martin 2018 was Solicitor in 1996
430. Hui Ling McCarthy 2018
431. Katherine Goddard 2019
432. Isabel Hitching 2019
433. Fiona Horlick 2019
434. Nina Grahame 2019
435. Sarah Pritchard 2019
436. Julia Smart 2019
437. Christina Michalos 2019
438. Aparna Nathan 2019
439. Michelle Nelson 2019
440. Catherine Cowton 2019 Recorder
441. Nicola Howard 2019 Recorder 2016
442. Sarah Jones 2019
443. Lindsay Lane 2019
444. Stephanie Tozer 2019
445. Narita Bahra 2019
446. Katherine Deal 2019
447. Margaret Gray 2019
448. (Catherine) Jane McCafferty 2019
449. Ronit Kreisberger 2019
450. Charlotte Kilroy 2019
451. Lorraine Cavanagh 2019
452. Constance McDonnell 2019
453. Sian Mirchandani 2019
454. Alison Morgan 2019
455. Diya Sen Gupta 2019
456. (Katherine) Valentina Sloane 2019
457. Jessica Stephens 2019
458. Anna Jane Boase 2019
459. Victoria Wakefield 2019
460. Victoria Butler-Cole 2019

With huge thanks to Eleanor Platt QC (#19) of 1 Garden Court Family Law chambers whose labour of love it has been to painstakingly compile and update this list, and who has allowed me to publish it here.

Over a beef sandwich and glass of crisp white wine at Fleet Street’s El Vino, the solicitor who led the charge for a the vote of no confidence in the Law Society’s former chief executive tells how he turned from ‘terrorist’ to Chancery Lane insider and, as it reels from the resignation of its latest chief, points out how it needs to change to survive. He also predicts the death of the criminal bar in 15 years and widespread bankruptcy if further legal aid cuts are implemented. 

Solicitor advocate and partner at Liverpool firm Parry Welch Lacey, James Parry, is best know for the campaign he lead for a motion of no confidence in the Law Society’s leadership in the wake of its deal on criminal legal aid with justice secretary Chris Grayling in 2013.

Vote of no confidence

The motion declared that the Society’s members had ‘no confidence in the ability’ of Nicholas Fluck, president, and Des Hudson, chief executive, to ‘properly and effectively represent’ legal aid solicitors in the negotiations with the government.

It was passed by 228 votes to 213. Hudson resign the following March, but said that he made the decision to quit the previous year.

Parry recalls how it happened. ‘We were sitting in the office one morning – everyone was saying that something should be done, but no one was doing anything. So we said “why don’t we do it?”

‘The first thing that happened when we started the call for a vote was a call from Des Hudson’s secretary to say Des would like to speak to me. It turned into a bit of a haranguing – I was stood on the naughty step for 15 minutes while he gave me his opinion on what I was doing. We had to agree to disagree’.

Two local lawyers were delegated to keep an eye on him and persuade him to come to heel. Then he was invited to attend a round-table meeting with Grayling – which was the first time he had been to Chancery Lane.

Parry expected to lose and he, reckons, the Law Society expected him too. ‘If it hadn’t been for social media we wouldn’t have won,’ he adds.

The Haldane Society unexpectedly put on a show of support outside the Chancery Lane HQ and on arriving Parry says he was aware there was support for the motion.

During the ‘fairly-chaired’ debate he recalls a key moment: ‘A lady, whose name I can’t remember, said “here we are surrounded by pictures of all these dead white men”.

For Parry it seemed a visual demonstration of how out of touch with its members the Society had become.

From terrorist to insider

Since those revolutionary days, Parry’s involvement with the Law Society has changed – he now chairs it criminal law committee.

After the dust had settled, Richard Atkinson, the then chairman of the committee, suggestion to Parry that if he was going to criticise the Law Society, he should do it from the inside, if he really wanted to bring about change.

‘I think he had point. It’s very easy to sit on the sides and snipe, but that’s not terribly constructive,’ says Parry.

‘The strange thing about my transformation from terrorist to insider, is that when I started the vote of no confidence I had no idea that the criminal law committee existed. I knew very little about the way the Law Society worked. I think that’s part of its problem’.

Wither Chancery Lane

Contemplating the Society’s future, he more than most is aware of its needs to change. ‘It’s not a regulator nowadays; it’s just a members’ society, but it is seen as irrelevant to many of its members’.

Though he says it would be a sad day when it happened, he can imagine a time when the Society no longer admitted solicitors. He can also see it splitting up because the needs of its diverse members are so varied.

City solicitors, he suggests, are well served by the City of London Law Society, criminal lawyers have their own groups and family practitioners, who have seen their legal aid work disappear, feel failed by it.

One of its difficulties, he says, is that it ‘was designed for a different century’ and has a ‘very slow chain of command’. Looking to the future it needs to be more transparent and more reactive to its members.

‘It has got to put itself in a position where it can survive on the membership that it can keep with it’. To do this, he suggests, it should become a training provider and trade union that actively promotes the interests of its members.

‘But they can’t do that on the basis that everything happens in London, because the majority of us aren’t in London,’ he adds.

Advocates’ Graduated Fee Scheme

Like many criminal solicitors, Parry is concerned about the proposed reforms to the advocates’ graduated fee scheme, currently being consulted on by the Ministry of Justice.

‘My personal view is that it is grossly unfair to the junior bar and solicitor advocates. It restores an increase to silks, but juniors will suffer’.

And it is the junior bar, he says, who will feel the pinch the most. ‘Firms will take the financial hit for their junior solicitors who get paid a wage, but junior barristers will take the hit themselves’.

He predicts that many young barristers will go in-house with law firms or turn away from criminal practice, which will remove the senior juniors and prosecutors of the future.

Looking at the fees on offer for juniors, after taking into account chambers’ rent, travel, and tax, he says ‘it’s not far off burger-flipping money’.

If it sticks by the new scheme, which it helped devise, he suggests the criminal bar will do itself enormous damage and will cease to exist within the next 10-15 years.

Fee cuts

As criminal practitioners are being asked to consider the new scheme for Crown court advocacy payments and to sign up to new criminal legal aid contracts, uncertainty remains over whether the second tranche of 8.75% fee cuts will be implemented.

The new contract comes into force in April and the fee cut is written into it, although it appears to have been put on the back burner by the Ministry of Justice.

Parry suspects that pressure from the Treasury will see the further cut made. And if that does happen, he predicts ‘some pretty high-profile bankruptcies in the near future’.

While many firms will feel they have not choice but to sign the new contract, if the cuts come in, he cannot firms will survive as fees have already been cut to the bone.

His own firm is undecided about whether to sign up to the new contract.

Merseyside court closures

As the ministry presses on with its programme of court closures, Parry reflects on the changes that have taken place on Merseyside. ‘In the last five or six years we’ve lost three of our major magistrates’ courts.

‘When I went to Liverpool in 1990, the magistrates’ court had 21 court rooms – it now sits in the crown court, where it has eight court rooms and a youth court that sits only twice a week.

He doubts that the decline in courts and cases reflects falling crime. Rather, he suggests: ‘People are being cautioned, let off, given final warnings and are not coming before the court.

‘That’s troubling, not because I want to see people criminalised, but if you don’t bring people before the courts you end up with secret justice, which then becomes injustice’.

It also causes a loss of confidence in the criminal justice system, because people still see crime around them, but nothing being done about it.

Cases, he says, are not getting to court, because the police do not have the staff to do the necessary work – partly due to cuts but also because they have been increasingly focused on sex offences and anti-terrorism. In addition, he says, the Crown Prosecution Service is ‘badly under-funded’ and cases are either not being prepared properly or are being dropped.

Impact of mean testing

 Means testing for legal aid eligibility was reintroduced in the magistrates’ court in 2006. Since then, says Parry, it has worked to deny people access to legal representation and justice.

If a couple’s joint income exceeds £239 a week, he explains, they will not be eligible for legal aid, which effectively means that the scheme only covers those on state benefits.

‘Huge numbers of people have been stripped out of legal aid. Legal aid is dying’. And the result is that people are either paying privately at a much lower rate than the legal aid rates or are representing themselves.

Brexit

 On the impact that Brexit will have on EU justice measures, he hopes that the use of the European Arrest Warrant and other crime fighting initiatives will remain.

‘It would be a travesty for us to be kicked out of law enforcement measures at this time of increased concern over terrorism.’ Adding: ‘The biggest increase in criminal activity is online and the internet does not respect borders’.

Anonymity for rape defendants

Considering the impact that false accusations have on those accused of rape and serious sexual offences, and in particular looking at the high-profile cases involving Paul Gambuccini and Cliff Richard, Parry believes there should be anonymity for defendants.

While he acknowledges the counter argument that naming defendants can lead to other victims coming forward, he observes that subsequent accusations can be dealt with in separate trials, as has happened in relation to Rolf Harris.

‘If you make an allegation of sexual impropriety against anyone it ruins their career. Their reputation is gone and an acquittal is insufficient to restore it’.

Route to law

Recounting how he got into the legal profession, Parry says it was an accident. ‘I ran away to sea just after my O-levels, joined the Royal Fleet Auxiliary and trained as a marine engineer’.

He qualified just before defence cuts came in that preceded the Falkland’s war, so had to look for a new path. Seeing that all major industry was drying up, he had to find an alternative path.

After completing a business studies diploma he took a job in the fines and fees department at Sunderland Magistrates’ Court, which he found exceedingly dull.

Going into court one day, he witnessed a bail application and thought he’d rather enjoy doing. Fortunately for him the burgeoning CPS was recruiting court staff to its ranks and the courts needed to replace the lost labour, so offered staff the opportunity to become trainee clerks.

Parry was also given the chance to study a part time degree and was taught contract law by the soon to become transport minister, Stephen Byers. ‘Whatever his failings as transport minister, he was an absolutely excellent contract law lecturer’.

He did a stint at Liverpool Magistrates’ Court where he administered legal aid and was engaged by the then Lord Chancellor’s Department to train staff to carry out the interests of justice test.

Parry qualified as a solicitor at the expense of the court service and went into private practice in 1996. He set up his own firm seven years ago and has recently carved out a niche doing dangerous dogs work.

He favours a change in the law that would mean dogs did not have to be destroyed just because of their breed and is a supporter of the charity Born Innocent, set up by barrister John Cooper QC.

‘Pit bulls aren’t the most dangerous dogs; you’re more likely to be bitten by a dachshund,’ he notes.

And with that, he is off the Petty France for a meeting with the ministry.

Over tuna, chips and a bottle of white plonk at Adjournments in a bustling Portcullis House, the chairman of the justice committee discusses the ‘wasted opportunity’ caused by Brexit, the pressing need for prison reform and why the legal profession should not rule out fusion.

Despite being a Conservative, the MP for Bromley and Chislehurst, Robert James MacGillivray ‘Bob’ Neill, is far from uncritical of the government.

Without criticising individual ministers, the Ministry of Justice as an institution, observes Neill, ‘is much too blinkered in its approach to things,’ perhaps, he suggests, because of the ‘lack of lawyers there who can stand up against institutional resistance and trust the people who can make things work.’

But he adds: ‘It’s not our (the committee’s) job to be confrontational with Liz (justice secretary and lord chancellor, Liz Truss) and her team — I like all of them personally. It’s our job to help them overcome the obstacles’.

Boosting the magistracy

The influential committee has just published two significant reports. The first, on the role of the magistracy, proposed doubling the sentencing powers of magistrates, and the second, on young adults in the criminal justice system, called for 18-25 year olds to be kept out of adult prisons.

The former, he says, received ‘interesting’ responses. ‘It’s the usual thing with government – they are happy to go with the easy bits, but shy away from the tough parts.

‘Although they have no evidence, as far as I can see, they are not prepared to implement the increased sentencing powers’. The MoJ, he explains, is worried that the move will increase the prison population, because it thinks magistrates are more likely to send offenders to prison than crown court judges – a view he suggests is outdated.

‘They say they have done the modelling, which suggests it would lead to an increase in custodial sentences. But if that’s the case, why on earth don’t they publish the evidence’.

While the ministry fixates on the impact on the prison population, it is missing savings that would be made to the crown court budget, he adds.

The committee has some hefty pieces of work on its to-do list. It has begun work on prison reform – an inquiry that Neill expects to run for a couple of years, with reports published during that time.

He is adamant that there must be a ‘right of centre, Conservative case’ made for alternatives to custody. ‘Locking people up is not good for offenders, or for preventing people becoming victims of crime, and it costs a shed load of money. There are better ways to do it’.

Just what does Brexit mean?

The committee has issued a call for evidence on the legal implications of Brexit. It will consider the impact on the justice process and the legal sector, what the government needs to address in its negotiations and steps to mitigate any adverse effects. The committee expects to begin hearings before the year is out.

Linked to that, is an analysis of the implications of Brexit on the crown dependencies.

An ‘unrepentant Remainer’, Neill nonetheless says he respects the outcome of the referendum and will not vote against the bill to repeal the EU Act, if the Supreme Court upholds the High Court’s ruling that parliamentary authority is required.

He is not happy with the name of the PM’s Great Repeal Bill and suggests it should more accurately be called the ‘Necessary’ Repeal Bill.

While he understands that the former prime minister, David Cameron, had to call the referendum ‘for management purposes’, following the ‘muffed campaign’ that meant the ‘Remain’ camp lost, Neill is saddened by what he sees as the ‘wasted opportunity’.

‘We could have had a perfectly stable, left of centre, broadly reforming Conservative government that was doing some good work on social issues.

‘All that has been thrown up in the air for a concept. What’s the reality of sovereignty in a modern world? It isn’t going to pay anyone’s rent or mortgage or give any value to people’s everyday lives’. Rather, he complains, Brexit has ‘taken over the life of the parliament’.

Wither Gove?

He is disappointed by the loss of Michael Gove as justice secretary and lord chancellor. ‘On a personal level, Michael was the Brexiteer I respected most – he had at least always believed in it, albeit wrongly.

‘He was doing a good job at justice and could have been a major, reforming Tory minister on social policy, like Peel or Disraeli, and that’s been thrown away because of the concept of sovereignty’.

The current incumbent, Truss, he says is ‘thoughtful, clever, though not as articulate as Michael, and wants to get it right’.

He gives her credit for ‘getting it right’ by shelving (for now) the proposed reforms to personal injury claims, that would have increased the small claims limit and removed the right to claim compensation for whiplash injuries.

‘She is very much into method, process and evidence. She took away all the boxes, read them over the summer and formed a judgment’.

He adds: ‘Having Ollie Heald (Oliver Heald, courts and justice minister) there is a big plus. Having done that sort of work at the bar, he would have seen that we were going down a blind alley with it’.

The problem for Truss initially, he says, was that people felt disappointed by the loss of Gove, who had given the impression that he was willing to listen to the profession, and they still felt the loss of Dominic Grieve, the lord chancellor that never was, whom Cameron sacked as attorney general.

‘Dominic was ill-treated. He shouldn’t have been dropped as the attorney. The job of the attorney is to speak truth to power. Although I remain a fan of David Cameron, his treatment of Dominic does not resound to his credit’.

In praise of fusion

Also on the committee’s list is an inquiry into legal regulation, so he is tight-lipped on what he would like to see and whether there should be a single regulator. ‘I’m conscious of the arguments either side,’ he says.

Unusually for a barrister, Neill says the profession should be prepared to contemplate fusion, which he says works in a lot of jurisdictions without any significant detriment to the profession or the public interest.

‘People always think of it in terms of America, which I don’t think is a good example. They should look at those Commonwealth countries that have adopted a fused model,’ he says.

‘The profession would be unwise to rule out fusion – they shouldn’t take absolute or entrenched positions,’ he suggests. Indeed, he ventures, struggling junior barristers might welcome the security of starting out in a fused profession, before developing a specialism as a court advocate.

From the client’s point of view, he says: ‘Your brief is your brief and it doesn’t matter if it’s a solicitor or barrister’.

With solicitor advocates, public access barristers and alternative business structures, some suggest the profession is already moving towards fusion.

Doing so incrementally, says Neill, may be sensible, and he is keen that it is not imposed on the profession, but says: ‘We shouldn’t be scared to talk about it’. He adds: ‘I say it as a friend, because I want the profession to succeed’.

Embracing the digital

On other issues, he counsels the legal profession to be ‘cuter’ in the way it makes its arguments opposing government policy.

A case in point is the reaction to digital courts, which the profession sees as a move towards de-lawyering. ‘It’s not naked self-interest, as all professions are inevitably cautious about change. But, maybe there’s a challenge for lawyers to do their job differently’.

If every time change is proposed, the profession complains, there is a danger, he says, that it is perceived as crying wolf. It risks losing credibility with parliament and the media, and its arguments may be discounted.

‘It is not a criticism that can be laid at the door of the current leadership of the bar or the Law Society, but they (the professions) got so shrill and were perceived as being quite partisan,’ he says, adding that ‘the bar was worse’.

‘The good arguments got lost in the general perception that it was a bit of an old boys’ and girls’ club being a bit protectionist, which was a shame’.

He accepts that the professions were right to oppose some proposals, for example, some of Chris Grayling’s reforms that were ultimately ditched.

Getting legal aid right

The government, he says, got it wrong with the scale of the legal aid cuts. Some cuts were necessary, but the number of unrepresented parties, particularly in family cases, he suggests, indicates that they went too far. He would like to see a rowing back in the chancellor’s autumn statement.

As the committee’s report in June pointed out, the government also got it wrong on employment tribunal fees. ‘I’m not over-impressed with the MoJ on the fees stuff so far. The litmus test will be what they do to employment tribunals,’ he says, adding that the committee is ‘getting a bit impatient’ waiting for the outcome of the ministry’s fee review. Neill he is not against cost-recovery, but says the fees need to be scaled back.

He adds: ‘If you think there are too many cases being brought, the correct approach is to change the substantive law and the legal test for permitting cases. There’s a danger that we use the fee system as a rationing system, which is not what it is intended to be’.

On the second tranche of criminal legal aid fee cuts, Neill says Truss is not in a rush to bring them in, and is focusing on making savings in other ways.

From the profession’s point of view, he suggests that a kick into the long grass is probably the best they could hope for and advises that their ‘best bet maybe to let sleeping dogs lie’.

Anonymity for rape suspects

More widely, he reckons the law on the admission of the sexual history of rape complainants works ‘sensibly and sensitively’ and does not need to be changed, as some argued following the Ched Evans case.

He would support anonymity for defendants in rape cases — even after charge — with the ability for the crown to make an application for it to be removed if there are ‘compelling reasons’.

And he would like to see more perjury cases brought where rape allegations have been proved to be false. ‘Making a false allegation is a pretty dire thing to do – you put someone in jeopardy of losing their liberty, as well as being vilified, and it’s an abuse of the process’.

Working class lad

A working class lad, Neill went to Abbs Cross Technical High School in Hornchurch and the London School of Economics. His father worked on the production line at Ford, his mother ran a shop, and his grandparents were teachers and dockers.

‘A product of that part of the East London,’ he describes himself as ‘a lawyer first and politician second,’ but he says the two have always been part of his life.

On his transition to full time politics, he reflects: ‘You get to the stage where you apply for silk and it does or doesn’t come off. Then you think about going onto the bench, which I think I might have enjoyed. But ultimately you are implementing somebody else’s decisions, which would be a frustration’.

Neill still keeps up with issues at the bar and was ‘chuffed’ to be made a bencher at his inn, Middle Temple. Outside work he enjoys opera and supports West Ham United football club. ‘One Saturday you could see me at Covet Garden and the next at the Olympic Park,’ he says with a wink.

Over fish and chips in Fleet Street’s El Vino, one of the country’s most respected and well-loved former Court of Appeal judges explains why he is a ‘complete remainer’, and shares his doubts about revenue-raising DPAs and his concerns over the ‘bureaucratic’ judicial appointments process.

Sir Anthony Hooper was called to the bar in 1965, practiced criminal law from 5 Paper Buildings and took silk in 1987. Appointed to the High Court in 1995, he was elevated to the Court of Appeal 2004, where he shared a corridor with two like-minded and similarly out-spoken and pragmatic colleagues Sir Robin Jacob and Sir Alan Moses. ‘We were called the naughty boy corridor,’ he recalls.

He remembers the time that new style High Court judicial robes, resembling those worn by ‘an evangelical choir’ where introduced. They were not widely liked, but says Hooper, pleased one member of the bench. ‘Because they were so large, you couldn’t see what someone was wearing underneath, so he didn’t need to wear a suit and went into court in just his shorts’.

Having reached the mandatory retirement age, Hooper hung up his robes in 2012. He reflects: ‘It is very hard work being a judge. I enjoyed it very much, but as with so many things, you move on. The government hasn’t asked me to be a security commissioner or an intelligence overseer’. But he has found other pursuits to occupy his brain.

‘As a retired judge there are restrictions on what work you can do – you’re not allowed give legal advice or appear as an advocate anywhere in the world. I’m quite happy not to give legal advice, but sometimes I wouldn’t mind being an advocate again,’ he says.

He continues: ‘There’s an argument for saying judges should be allowed more leeway – they are in the United States. But one doesn’t want a situation where a former judge of the Court of Appeal becomes an advocate in Southwark Crown Court’.

Since leaving the bench, Hooper has been an associate member of Matrix. ‘I really love it; it’s a wonderful home for me’.

And he has been no slouch. He has recently returned from East Africa where, on behalf of the United Nations and the World Bank’s Stolen Assets Recovery Unit, he has been training judges handling corruption cases, in particular dealing with proceeds of crime legislation.

He spends a large amount of his time investigating corruption for the International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF).

‘I’ve been appointed to investigate individuals against whom the Ethics Commission has found a prima facie case. Last year I did a report on four people and following that report all four were suspended – three for life and one for five years. It’s public knowledge I’m looking that I’m looking at other people’.

He explains that he is not concerned with doping, but with corruption, although doping is the background to the investigations.

As the country prepares to go to ballot box over the UK’s continued membership of the European Union, Hooper shares his strong views.

‘I am a complete remainer. I have followed many of the arguments that have been raised, and I know it’s a very complex issue. But, I start from a very personal standpoint.

‘I was born in 1937. In February 1942 my father, part of Bomber Command, was killed on a raid on a German naval base in France. His plane was shot down and eventually crashed.

‘Six months later my grandmother was dead, as a result of a loose bomb dropped by a returning German bomber. He presumably decided he didn’t want to take his bombs home, so just dropped them. That literally took out the house in which my grandmother lived in a small village in Dorset.’

Then as, an eight-year-old boy he recalls seeing the horrific pictures of the liberated concentrated camps of Belsen and Auschwitz. ‘Those images are seared into my memory’.

The EU, he explains, gives two freedoms – freedom from and freedom to. ‘The freedom from is the freedom from Western European armed conflict. There have been no armed conflicts within Western Europe since 1945.

‘The freedom to is the freedom to exercise the great fundamental rights of the EU – freedom of movement of persons, goods, capital and services’.

For him freedom of movement is particularly important. ‘Some people today don’t remember what it was like when one had border controls. Now one can drive across Europe without any reference to border controls.

Withdrawal from the EU, he says, will mean fighting for the freedoms that we have hitherto enjoyed, and will necessitate, at huge cost, the ‘bureaucratic nightmare of re-establishing government controls over people moving’.

Under EU provisions Hooper was able to appear as an advocate in the French Court of Appeal. ‘That could be inconceivable in the future, unless we manage to negotiate new terms. And if we negotiate those terms, we might as well be back in the EU anyway’.

He does not want the right to work abroad to be dependant on a ‘bureaucratic machine’ in the Home Office or foreign equivalent.

In the event of a Brexit and the consequent break-up of the EU, he fears ‘a slow process, aided and abetted by Mr Putin, to break off Hungary, Poland, Lithuania’.

‘All those countries have border issues and people from other nationalities living round their borders. It’s not impossible to imagine a situation where rabid or ultra-nationalism comes back in and persuades people to kick out the foreigners from their country, followed by outside intervention.’

Parts of the Brexit campaign, he says, have been ‘absolutely outrageous’, and he accepts that the remain campaign has ‘overdone the fear factor’. But, he insists, there will be significant economic consequences to Brexit.

His next point, he concedes is ‘not a good argument to put forward for remain’, but nonetheless observes: ‘Look at those who want us to leave – Mr Putin, Donald Trump, the chameleon-like Boris Johnson, Chris Grayling (who managed to destroy the criminal justice system in his short tenure in office), Nigel Farage, George Galloway, Michael Gove. I’m not sure that I want to be in the same camp as that lot. They are an unsavoury lot’.

Another factor in the EU’s favour, he notes, is the fact that it has been one of the only organisations to stand up to the large American companies, like Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Apple, and examined their practices from the point of view of anti-competitive practices or tax avoidance.

Like most, Hooper, is uncertain which way the vote will go. Adapting Harold Wilson’s comment, he observes ‘a day is a very long time in politics’.

Given his work with the World Bank, he says about the Bribery Act here. ‘It’s probably the most stringent bribery act in the world now, of which I am aware’.

Unlike the American legislation, it does not have exceptions for so called facilitation payments, under which payments are permitted for enabling things to which you have a legal right to have done.

Though few companies have been prosecuted under it, he expects the Act has given many cause for concern due to the ‘failure to prevent provisions’, which enable the prosecution of companies that do not in place proper anti-corruption procedures.

Last year saw the first deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) this side of the pond. Hooper is not a great fan of the American export. He observes that prosecutors state-side have taken billions off companies, often only remotely linked to the USA, and returned only a small percentage to the countries where the bribery took place.

‘When I talk about DPAs I sometimes give this apocryphal and slightly tongue in cheek example.

‘I’m a French company and I go to Africa. I want to do a deal with their Ministry of Defence, but am told that no one gets a contract with the MoD unless they pay 10% to the Minister – that’s just the absolute rule. You either pay or you don’t get the work. The company decides to pay.

‘The Americans or the British get to hear about it and investigate – and they say that unless I pay $1bn, they’ll prosecute me. I ask the audience to contemplate those two scenarios’.

Hooper has doubts about the Prime Minister’s desire to expand corporate liability to a failure to prevent to money laundering and fraud, observing ‘it’s a wonderful way to increase revenue – it’s a tax on companies – maybe that’s a good thing’.

Adding with a chuckle: ‘It’s also wonderful for lawyers.’

Appointed to the bench by Lord Mackay, he is concerned by the lack of progress made towards increasing judicial diversity and unimpressed with the new system of judicial appointment.

‘I’m far from certain that I would be appointed under the modern system of interviewing and role play’.

He questions how you can decide if someone is suitable for the Court of Appeal on the basis of an interview, and voices concern that ‘we have lost something by this very bureaucratic method’.

‘I’m not saying the system under which I was appointed was any better; it no doubt had huge problems. But now you have someone who wants to be a recorder having to take a written exam.’

The concept of making a recorder, seeking a circuit appointment, go on a course and undertake role play to determine if they are suitable, he finds ‘extraordinary’ and suggests people will learn only to give the answers they know are required.

Looking at the transcripts of their trials, he says, will tell you all you need to know about what sort of judge they will be.

He recalls an account relayed to him of the role–play exercise of one wannabe circuit judge. ‘He was told that someone would come in to get him in 10 minutes for him to hear an application.

‘After eight or nine minutes someone came in and said “I’m sorry, we’re not ready for you; you can’t come in to court.” He said “rubbish, I am coming in” and strode into court’.

The fellow had assumed it was part of the role-play, and that he was required to show robustness in ensuring that the court ran efficiently. But, arriving in court, he found that the assessors really were not ready for him and were still dealing with the previous candidate.

Selecting judges, he accepts, is tricky, but ‘all this role-play stuff and answering questions, is looking only at what someone has achieved’. Rather, he says: ‘What you need to look at is potential, and that is hard to assess’.

On the future of the criminal bar, Hooper is ‘very depressed’. ‘It has so radically changed in my lifetime. Anyone charged with a serious criminal offence could have top quality advocates, but they have been driven away by nickel and diming them on the money and by a propaganda campaign by Grayling and his predecessors.’

Now, he fears for the quality of representation and laments the destruction of the legal aid system, which was ‘Attlee’s great legacy’.

Speaking of things not being what they used to be, El Vino has recently reopened following a refurbishment, after being sold to wine bar chain Davy’s. It is lighter and brighter, but much quieter than in its heyday.

‘I remember this place when it really was the place at the centre of the two worlds – the bar and the press’.

He gestures towards tables behind him: ‘The 27-stone James Crespi QC [injured in the 1973 Old Bailey bombing] regaled everyone with his stories from there, and over there they’d be journalists like Alan Watkins and Peregrine Worsthorne.

‘Women were not allowed to stand at the bar. The owner’s defence to the discrimination case fought against him by members of the bar was that it was the only way to protect male barristers from women – he lost’.

If he hadn’t done law, Hooper imagines that he would have like to direct films, like his Nephew, Tom Hooper, who lists among his credits The King’s Speech and Les Miserables.

‘I gave Tom a 16mm Bolex camera and he made his first film with it. So I feel a little link there,’ he says with fondness.

But reflecting on his life, he says: ‘I have absolutely no regrets. I’ve made choices, I’ve enjoyed my life and I’ve been hugely fortunate’.

Over a light lunch of lobster and prosciutto croquettes and a small sauvignon blanc at J Sheekey’s, the clinical negligence silk whose biography of eminent Victorian barrister Sir Edward Marshall Hall is out this month, consider what makes a great advocate, the stress of taking capital cases and the changing legal times.

Sally Smith QC established a medical law practice at London’s One Crown Office and has worked on some of the most high-profile cases, including the Alder Hey hospital child organ retention case, leading the prosecution of the doctor who sought to draw a link between autism and MMR and representing the strategic health authority in the Mid Staffs public inquiry.

And she met her cardiologist husband, Professor Roger Hall, who was her expert witness during a long-running clinical negligence case.

But she fell into law by accident, in the first term of a history degree at the LSE under the tutorship of the, then unknown, David Starkey. ‘I went to a lecture thinking it was going to be on the Tudors, but it turned out to be on the law of contract. I felt too shy to clamber out over all of these denim-clad knees, so I sat it out.’

Finding that law floated her boat more than history, Smith told Starkey that she wanted to swap subjects. ‘He said: “It’s entirely up to you, but you’ll be terribly, terribly bored”’.

Smith has always been passionate about biographies. ‘I don’t care who they’re about. I’ve always had this preoccupation with the nature of truth,’ she says, apologising for sounding ‘terribly pompous’.

‘It ties in very well with being a lawyer. I’m interested in versions of events and have leant there’s no such thing as truth’.

Pointing out that law and biography are about looking at evidence, she says: ‘This sounds really nerdy, but if I read a biography or a diary, where the subject has been to a dinner party, I’ll go and look up somebody else who was at it and read their account of the same dinner party.’

For years, she says, she had fancied penning one herself, but struggled to find an appropriate subject. She read the first biography of Marshall Hall, written by barrister and Tory politician Edward Marjoribanks and wanted to find out more about the man behind the myth, from a modern perspective.

‘Because it was written in 1929 it’s very restrained about his personal life and quite uncritical. I thought it would be interesting to see what he was really about. I began some Googling and it sort of turned into a project’.

Her internet sleuthing turned up an auction house selling artefacts that had belonged to him, including a desk and smoking jacket. Pursuing the trail, she wrote asking the auction house to pass her details on to the seller.

‘Two weeks later the phone rang and it was a lady in Wales. Her father had been Marshall Hall’s daughter’s executor. Marshall Hall’s daughter had never married and left everything in her house to this woman’s father’.

The lady had boxes and boxes of his papers, which had been gathering dust in her loft for years. Smith drove down to have a read and was then on a roll. From the papers, she found a close friend of his at the bar and contacted his family.

He had prosecuted Marshal Hall on many occasions and his family had kept a lot of the briefs. ‘I was literally undoing the pink ribbon on briefs which hadn’t been undone for a hundred years. It was extraordinary’.

Marshall Hall was involved in some of the most famous trials of his age, including the Camden Town murder, Seddon the Poisoner, the Brides in the Bath, the Green Bicycle Murder and the Murder at the Savoy.

Finding out about them, did not require much detective work. ‘He was the most consummate self-publicist you could possibly imagine and kept every press cutting from his first case, when he was totally unknown. They’re all in Inner Temple library – 38 volumes.’

Hall, born in 1858 and died during a trial in 1927, notes Smith, saved more people from the hangman’s noose than any other barrister. A combination of his moving and passionate oratory, charm and good looks saw him achieve a level of fame that no other barrister has, or will.

‘He was absolutely adored by the public, who felt that he was a saviour of the common man. He was a film star figure and showman. The newspaper headlines called him the handsomest man in England.’

‘When he died, the King sent a telegram to his wife, all the shops along the funeral route closed, cars and buses stopped and the working men in the street doffed their caps and stood in reverence as the cortege drove passed’.

Explaining the secret of his success, she observes: ‘He was six foot three, when the average height was five foot eight. He was said to be impossibly charming and he was famous for having the most beautiful voice.

‘This may not be what people like to hear, but if you’re a man being very tall and, whatever sex you are, being exceptionally good looking, is inevitably going to help’.

She adds: ‘He had the raw material – a mixture of real emotion and technique. In the end, you’ve just got it or you haven’t, even now. You can train anyone up to a point, but the extra bit that makes someone exceptional is innate’.

Advocacy then, says Smith, involved a lot of theatrical technique and would seem ‘ridiculously over-dramatic’ nowadays, but it determined the outcome of cases more so than today because people were tried on so little evidence.

‘Forensic evidence was at an embryonic stage. It wasn’t until 1901 that they were able to distinguish human blood from animal blood, finger-printing evidence was not used until 1903 and there was no court of appeal until 1907.’

‘People were hanged pretty soon after being convicted. I don’t think we realise what an extraordinary pressure that was on the bar. To have a healthy man whose entire fate was resting on what you happened to say on a particular day, is a very odd thought’.

Marshall Hall, says Smith, was haunted by the people that he did not get acquitted and he would write to them afterwards saying ‘may God have mercy on your soul’.

His private life, she notes, was just as sensational as his public life – with two turbulent marriages and mistresses.

‘He married his childhood sweetheart with whom he had a terribly miserable marriage from the word go’. Teasingly, she says: ‘You’ll have to read the book to find out why’.

But she does give away that it ended in tragedy after she had an affair with a French officer in the Indian army. ‘He sent her off for an illegal abortion in the most sordid of circumstances and she died after the most dreadful botch-up. The abortionist was charged with her murder and tried at the Old Bailey while Marshal Hall was a very young barrister’.

After her death, says Smith, Marshall Hall ‘went into complete decline and was desperate with unhappiness for years’. But the experience, she says, made him acutely aware of the suffering of women and he became famous for championing women throughout his career.

‘In the day when prostitutes were regarded as absolutely disposable and judges described them as brazen and wanton, Marshall Hall stood up in front of an all male juries and said these women were what men had made them’.

She quotes the line from the speech that made him famous: ‘As a prostitute sat in the dock weeping, he said: “look at her members of the jury – God never gave her a chance, won’t you?”’

Former barrister and broadcaster, Clive Anderson, wrote the foreword to the book. ‘He said that Marshall Hall had emotional intelligence. I think that’s true, and that’s why people loved him,’ says Smith, who admits to wishing that she had made the observation herself.

Having recently become engrossed in The Archer’s storyline of Helen who, after a slow burn of emotional abuse, snapped and stabbed her controlling, manipulative husband Rob, Smith is sure Marshall Hall would have been fighting Helen’s corner. ‘I’m sure he would have done it beautifully’.

She is equally as confident that he would not have had much time for the dreaded Quality Assurance Scheme for Advocates (QASA). ‘One of the things Marshall Hall was famous for was being indescribably offensive to judges. So I don’t think he’d think much of the idea of being assessed by judges. I think he’d treat it with contempt’.

Marshall Hall, says Smith, paid the price for his contempt of the establishment. ‘He was never made a High Court judge, and people have always questioned why’.

Smith thinks she has unearthed the reason – contained in a handwritten footnote in parliamentary archives. But she is giving nothing away. ‘You’ll have to read the book to find out.’

Having got her first book under her belt, Smith is keen to write another. She is not going back to practice, but will remain an associate member of her chambers, while she works on it. ‘I feel really in need of a change and I’d like to try to reinvent myself before it’s too late and I just retire’.

The next biography will be another legal personality – someone who is ‘interesting and also dead’.

‘My perfect period is the Marshall Hall period. He spanned the late Victorian and early Edwardian era, which was the beginning of a system of recognisable English law.

‘The law courts in The Strand were built, a new way of administering justice came in, with daily cause lists and things that made the public aware of what was going on. The Bailey was built in 1907,’ she says.

The period, she says, is not too distant in time that she cannot envisage it, but distant enough to be romantic.

She regrets the loss of the former romance of the Inns of Court, but points out that she, as a woman, would not have been admitted to the bar at that time.

‘It wasn’t until the First World War that women could come to the bar. When women first served on juries, they had a special room with mirrors and hairpins, and an article in The Times questioned how they would be able to do their public duty and still be able to perform their domestic duties.’

On balance, she concludes: ‘I think we should be glad of the changes that have taken place since then’.

Marshall Hall: A Law unto Himself is published by Wildy & Sons.