*/
The storm clouds gather. By William Byfield*
June 23, 2025 – Mason Cooley
These are strange times in the Crown Court. Full of contradiction. The general idea, according to the rumour mill, is that the right to trial by jury will be further restricted, presumably replaced by a judge alone or a judge with magistrates or perhaps just magistrates or a district judge. On the other hand, despite the terrible backlog, there is still the spectacle of Recorders being heavily under-utilised and empty courtrooms and senior barristers out of work.
I meet occasionally with some of my fellow Heads of Chambers and we chew the fat (apparently a phrase of naval origin). Most of us have seen it all before, so to speak, and all of us talk to our members and get a pretty good impression of what is going on. As Recorders, on the few occasions when we can sit for a period longer than a day unless we have a dreaded ‘serious sex’ ticket, we also get a pretty good birds-eye view of what is happening on the ground. I suspect, grandly, that it is rather like monarchs and other heads of state when they meet but on a very much more parochial basis.
This in turn reminds me of a meeting many years ago I had with officials from an unpopular regime who wished to challenge a sanctions order. I don’t want to be unnecessarily self-deprecating, but, even if I had an ego the size of a palace, I would have been forced to admit that this was not my normal area of work. I was introduced to it by a pupil in Chambers whose uncle was a distinguished internationalist, but even he did not really know why I had been selected. We had a consultation in a select hotel in the deepest countryside. The officials seemed very keen – understandably – not to be overheard, but we eventually descended into the dining room. It was early and there were only three other men in suits sitting on the other side of the room. I joked ‘MI5’. The most senior official, described as ‘security’, grimaced. ‘MI6 in fact,’ he said. He waved to them. They waved back.
When I asked why I had been chosen, they seemed remarkably knowledgeable about the minutiae of my past. The second of the two officials, described as ‘minister’, commented that they knew I had once taken part in a balloon debate as James II. I struggled to remember that, but then it came back to me and I nodded. ‘Your argument,’ the minister continued, ‘was that, however bad he was, King James (he pronounced it ‘Jamus’) was the lawful king and that order was to be preferred to brutish anarchy.’ I began to see the parallel.
The pupil had also told me that they would rank their problems in order of importance as (a) protecting the leader (b) assuring his family’s safety and (c) ensuring salaries of civil servants could be paid, but that the advice they really wanted from me, despite what would be theatrical faux shock, was that the true importance must be in precisely the reverse order with their salaries at the top. Since that would have been my advice anyway, I enjoyed watching the well-acted horror masking unmistakable pleasure. The youngest official, described as ‘junior diplomat in London’, could hardly hide his glee.
So it was with our Heads’ recent meet-up, over wine and snacks. We bemoaned the lack of work, the mess that is the criminal justice system and we even had constructive discussions about bold solutions such as hiving off the torrent of domestic abuse cases which invariably suffer from complainants having changes of heart or understandable fears and rarely have smooth starts. Could we not have a new court, part-family part-criminal, with powers to try and mediate with strong safeguards those cases that could be resolved but with criminal powers of punishment where that was justified.
Then one of us, a slightly nervous man called Christopher Caust, came to the big question. As if he were just asking about the weather, he said ‘Any restlessness in your sets?’. Like deer smelling the hounds (in countries still permitting such barbarities) we all looked up. Saskia Grayson, who finds hiding things difficult, said the one word: ‘bit’. Some coughed. One or two looked at phones or fidgeted. I felt slightly sick.
My sanctions case never happened in the end because of supervening international events. The dinner was a culinary triumph, however. I know we were all thinking the same thing at our trade union dinner last week. Were supervening events about to overtake us and our members?
William Byfield is the pseudonym of a senior member of the Bar. Gutteridge Chambers, and the events that happen there, are entirely fictitious.
June 23, 2025 – Mason Cooley
These are strange times in the Crown Court. Full of contradiction. The general idea, according to the rumour mill, is that the right to trial by jury will be further restricted, presumably replaced by a judge alone or a judge with magistrates or perhaps just magistrates or a district judge. On the other hand, despite the terrible backlog, there is still the spectacle of Recorders being heavily under-utilised and empty courtrooms and senior barristers out of work.
I meet occasionally with some of my fellow Heads of Chambers and we chew the fat (apparently a phrase of naval origin). Most of us have seen it all before, so to speak, and all of us talk to our members and get a pretty good impression of what is going on. As Recorders, on the few occasions when we can sit for a period longer than a day unless we have a dreaded ‘serious sex’ ticket, we also get a pretty good birds-eye view of what is happening on the ground. I suspect, grandly, that it is rather like monarchs and other heads of state when they meet but on a very much more parochial basis.
This in turn reminds me of a meeting many years ago I had with officials from an unpopular regime who wished to challenge a sanctions order. I don’t want to be unnecessarily self-deprecating, but, even if I had an ego the size of a palace, I would have been forced to admit that this was not my normal area of work. I was introduced to it by a pupil in Chambers whose uncle was a distinguished internationalist, but even he did not really know why I had been selected. We had a consultation in a select hotel in the deepest countryside. The officials seemed very keen – understandably – not to be overheard, but we eventually descended into the dining room. It was early and there were only three other men in suits sitting on the other side of the room. I joked ‘MI5’. The most senior official, described as ‘security’, grimaced. ‘MI6 in fact,’ he said. He waved to them. They waved back.
When I asked why I had been chosen, they seemed remarkably knowledgeable about the minutiae of my past. The second of the two officials, described as ‘minister’, commented that they knew I had once taken part in a balloon debate as James II. I struggled to remember that, but then it came back to me and I nodded. ‘Your argument,’ the minister continued, ‘was that, however bad he was, King James (he pronounced it ‘Jamus’) was the lawful king and that order was to be preferred to brutish anarchy.’ I began to see the parallel.
The pupil had also told me that they would rank their problems in order of importance as (a) protecting the leader (b) assuring his family’s safety and (c) ensuring salaries of civil servants could be paid, but that the advice they really wanted from me, despite what would be theatrical faux shock, was that the true importance must be in precisely the reverse order with their salaries at the top. Since that would have been my advice anyway, I enjoyed watching the well-acted horror masking unmistakable pleasure. The youngest official, described as ‘junior diplomat in London’, could hardly hide his glee.
So it was with our Heads’ recent meet-up, over wine and snacks. We bemoaned the lack of work, the mess that is the criminal justice system and we even had constructive discussions about bold solutions such as hiving off the torrent of domestic abuse cases which invariably suffer from complainants having changes of heart or understandable fears and rarely have smooth starts. Could we not have a new court, part-family part-criminal, with powers to try and mediate with strong safeguards those cases that could be resolved but with criminal powers of punishment where that was justified.
Then one of us, a slightly nervous man called Christopher Caust, came to the big question. As if he were just asking about the weather, he said ‘Any restlessness in your sets?’. Like deer smelling the hounds (in countries still permitting such barbarities) we all looked up. Saskia Grayson, who finds hiding things difficult, said the one word: ‘bit’. Some coughed. One or two looked at phones or fidgeted. I felt slightly sick.
My sanctions case never happened in the end because of supervening international events. The dinner was a culinary triumph, however. I know we were all thinking the same thing at our trade union dinner last week. Were supervening events about to overtake us and our members?
The storm clouds gather. By William Byfield*
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