Barristers

One of the country’s leading QCs has suggested that barristers on the Attorney General’s panels should consider resigning in protest at the government’s hostility to the law and lawyers.

There can be “no excuse” for a barrister suggesting that a female Asian judge only secured her position as a result of positive discrimination, a Bar disciplinary tribunal has ruled.

Positive action – such as giving female barristers preferential access to briefs after returning to chambers from career breaks – can help address diversity problems, the Bar Council says.

The frontline regulators may be forced to fund the Legal Choices website if it is to reach its potential to become a “flagship consumer resource”, the Legal Services Board has hinted.

The Legal Services Board has launched its review of the quality of the Bar Standards Board’s decision-making – but is not going to look at the controversy around last month’s Bar exams.

A barrister has been reprimanded and fined for misleading Google in trying to get a negative review taken down. He said he had been subjected to “distressing online trolling”.

A QC who accused prosecution counsel of bad faith without reasonable grounds was in breach of Bar Standards Board rules but not to the level of professional misconduct, a tribunal has ruled.

The early signs are that the performance of Bar students in last month’s controversial exams was “broadly in line” with the average, the Bar Standards Board said yesterday.

A barrister has been reprimanded and fined for suggesting that a female Asian judge only secured her position as a result of “positive discrimination”.

A London commercial chambers has put up £20,000 to fund a pupillage that a criminal set has had to withdraw because of the impact of Covid-19, in a move hailed as showing the spirit of the Bar.

Problems with the Bar exams were far more extensive than previously reported, the Bar Standards Board admits as barristers warn that ‘pen and paper’ resits next month could breach equality law.

Claims of race discrimination brought by a barrister against the Bar Standards Board as part of a decade-long dispute have been dismissed as time-barred by an employment tribunal.

The number of chambers delaying pupillages that were due to start this month or next is likely to have a knock-on effect on the supply of places until 2022, the Bar Standards Board said today.

The Bar Standards Board has launched a pilot reverse mentoring scheme, in which Bar students and junior barristers from BAME backgrounds mentor senior White barristers.

A hugely experienced criminal defence barrister who shouted and pulled faces at a judge should have sent her a letter of apology, a Bar disciplinary tribunal has said.