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Can this year’s landmark 25th Annual Bar Conference grapple with the mounting challenges facing the Bar and reinvigorate those who feel most battle weary? Definitely, say Kim Hollis QC and Toby Craig.
It’s fitting that the Bar Conference sees its silver Jubilee during a year of historical and potentially radical changes for the entire legal profession. When else can every individual involved in the business of the Bar come together and help influence the future of all our careers?
This year it finds a new home at the Hilton London Metropole where on Saturday, 6 November 2010, barristers, clerks, solicitors and many others will convene for a packed programme that will consider core values, the changes arising from the Legal Services Act 2007 and how domestic and international opportunities can be improved.
The theme
The theme of this year’s Conference, Raising the Bar: Core Values v Opportunities, is a celebration of the founding principles of the profession. But it also puts practice development under the spotlight and explores how business opportunities can be taken advantage of without compromising on values. In the wake of the Legal Services Act 2007, and an increasingly globalised legal marketplace, the nature of the Bar’s services will change, and it is right for the profession to come together and debate the future of the Bar.
Chairman of the Bar, Nick Green QC, will outline his evolving vision for the future of the Bar and how it can not only survive, but grow stronger in the decades ahead. For many, this will sound like an unachievable feat, but delegates will leave the auditorium able to understand better the opportunities that lie underneath the changes.
What’s in it for you?
As well as up to 7.5 ever enticing CPD points, this year:
The specialist sessions
The specialist sessions, hosted by SBAs, Circuits and other Bar groups will engage with topics including criminal, family, commercial and chancery law issues, regulatory affairs and offer advocacy training. Three particular highlights are:
(1) Broader horizons: How the core values of the criminal Bar offer wider opportunities
Criminal Bar Association Chairman, Christopher Kinch QC, will moderate a speaking panel including Brian Altman QC, Jeremy Dein QC, Michael Hillman and Sean Larkin QC, which will discuss:
(2) The changing face of the Commercial Court
Organised by the Commercial Bar Association, this workshop sees the return of the popular interactive roundtable discussion format, as commercial practitioners debate topics including:
(3) Advanced Advocacy Skills
Advocacy skills and expertise lie at the core of the Bar, being a mark of distinction essential to the future of the profession. Most successful advocates are not simply born with these skills, they acquire them through learning by doing.
Each year the South Eastern Circuit runs the Keble Advanced International Advocacy Course in Oxford. The course is renowned worldwide for successfully teaching advocacy. Its teaching structures and techniques have been exported to many other common law jurisdictions.
This interactive workshop will draw upon the key highlights of the course to provide delegates with an opportunity to focus on how their advocacy skills may successfully be developed, regardless of area of practice and seniority. It will consider skeleton arguments, opening and closing speeches and key examination/cross-examination techniques.
To register
The Annual Bar Conference is the profession’s only event which seeks to draw all walks of the legal community under one roof to debate the Bar’s future. Each year the calibre of speakers bring a rich programme to life and the Jubilee Conference will keep up the tradition.
To register for this year’s 25th Bar Conference, please visit www.barcouncil.org.uk or call 01202 699 488.
Kim Hollis QC is Chair of the Bar Conference Organisation Board. Toby Craig is the Bar Council’s Head of Communications
The highlights
We are delighted to welcome the Attorney General, Dominic Grieve QC MP, a longstanding friend of, and contributor to, the Bar Conference to open this 25th annual event. The keynote address will be delivered by the Master of the Rolls, Lord Neuberger, whose report on Entry to the Bar in 2007 has had an enormous influence on the Bar’s approach to access to the profession.
The Open Forum debate, which concludes the Conference, will address “the ‘price’ of freedom”. Chaired by BBC Home Affairs Correspondent, Danny Shaw, the panel will include:
The panel will address whether the rule of law and principles of natural justice need to be balanced against economic imperatives, particularly in an “age of austerity”. It will also examine to what these end these principles need to be flexible to guarantee security and arguably freedom.
This year it finds a new home at the Hilton London Metropole where on Saturday, 6 November 2010, barristers, clerks, solicitors and many others will convene for a packed programme that will consider core values, the changes arising from the Legal Services Act 2007 and how domestic and international opportunities can be improved.
The theme
The theme of this year’s Conference, Raising the Bar: Core Values v Opportunities, is a celebration of the founding principles of the profession. But it also puts practice development under the spotlight and explores how business opportunities can be taken advantage of without compromising on values. In the wake of the Legal Services Act 2007, and an increasingly globalised legal marketplace, the nature of the Bar’s services will change, and it is right for the profession to come together and debate the future of the Bar.
Chairman of the Bar, Nick Green QC, will outline his evolving vision for the future of the Bar and how it can not only survive, but grow stronger in the decades ahead. For many, this will sound like an unachievable feat, but delegates will leave the auditorium able to understand better the opportunities that lie underneath the changes.
What’s in it for you?
As well as up to 7.5 ever enticing CPD points, this year:
The specialist sessions
The specialist sessions, hosted by SBAs, Circuits and other Bar groups will engage with topics including criminal, family, commercial and chancery law issues, regulatory affairs and offer advocacy training. Three particular highlights are:
(1) Broader horizons: How the core values of the criminal Bar offer wider opportunities
Criminal Bar Association Chairman, Christopher Kinch QC, will moderate a speaking panel including Brian Altman QC, Jeremy Dein QC, Michael Hillman and Sean Larkin QC, which will discuss:
(2) The changing face of the Commercial Court
Organised by the Commercial Bar Association, this workshop sees the return of the popular interactive roundtable discussion format, as commercial practitioners debate topics including:
(3) Advanced Advocacy Skills
Advocacy skills and expertise lie at the core of the Bar, being a mark of distinction essential to the future of the profession. Most successful advocates are not simply born with these skills, they acquire them through learning by doing.
Each year the South Eastern Circuit runs the Keble Advanced International Advocacy Course in Oxford. The course is renowned worldwide for successfully teaching advocacy. Its teaching structures and techniques have been exported to many other common law jurisdictions.
This interactive workshop will draw upon the key highlights of the course to provide delegates with an opportunity to focus on how their advocacy skills may successfully be developed, regardless of area of practice and seniority. It will consider skeleton arguments, opening and closing speeches and key examination/cross-examination techniques.
To register
The Annual Bar Conference is the profession’s only event which seeks to draw all walks of the legal community under one roof to debate the Bar’s future. Each year the calibre of speakers bring a rich programme to life and the Jubilee Conference will keep up the tradition.
To register for this year’s 25th Bar Conference, please visit www.barcouncil.org.uk or call 01202 699 488.
Kim Hollis QC is Chair of the Bar Conference Organisation Board. Toby Craig is the Bar Council’s Head of Communications
The highlights
We are delighted to welcome the Attorney General, Dominic Grieve QC MP, a longstanding friend of, and contributor to, the Bar Conference to open this 25th annual event. The keynote address will be delivered by the Master of the Rolls, Lord Neuberger, whose report on Entry to the Bar in 2007 has had an enormous influence on the Bar’s approach to access to the profession.
The Open Forum debate, which concludes the Conference, will address “the ‘price’ of freedom”. Chaired by BBC Home Affairs Correspondent, Danny Shaw, the panel will include:
The panel will address whether the rule of law and principles of natural justice need to be balanced against economic imperatives, particularly in an “age of austerity”. It will also examine to what these end these principles need to be flexible to guarantee security and arguably freedom.
Can this year’s landmark 25th Annual Bar Conference grapple with the mounting challenges facing the Bar and reinvigorate those who feel most battle weary? Definitely, say Kim Hollis QC and Toby Craig.
It’s fitting that the Bar Conference sees its silver Jubilee during a year of historical and potentially radical changes for the entire legal profession. When else can every individual involved in the business of the Bar come together and help influence the future of all our careers?
Far-ranging month for the Chair of the Bar
Marie Law, Director of Toxicology at AlphaBiolabs, examines the most recent data on alcohol misuse in the UK, and the implications for alcohol testing in family proceedings
Clement Cowley, Partner at The Penny Group, explains how tailored financial planning can help barristers take control of their finances and plan with confidence
Marie Law, Director of Toxicology at AlphaBiolabs
A £500 donation from AlphaBiolabs has been made to the leading UK charity tackling international parental child abduction and the movement of children across international borders
Marie Law, Director of Toxicology at AlphaBiolabs, outlines the drug and alcohol testing options available for family law professionals, and how a new, free guide can help identify the most appropriate testing method for each specific case
In this wide-ranging interview, Professor Jo Delahunty KC, Family Law KC of the Year, talks to Anthony Inglese CB about the values that shaped her, the moment she found her vocation and, in an intensely personal call to arms, why time is running out for the legal aid Bar
Is the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office process fit for purpose? Women barristers’ experiences of bullying are not being reported or, if they are, they are not making it through the system, says Tana Adkin KC
Thomas Roe KC and Andrew O’Kola respond to an article by Dr Leonardo Raznovich (Counsel , October 2025) – ‘Privy Council colonialism? Piercing the constitutional veil’
Chair of the Bar reports back
The client’s best interests could be well-served by sharing the advocacy with junior counsel more often than you might think – Naomi Cunningham and Charlotte Eves explore some less orthodox ways to divide the speaking role
