William Byfield's Secret E-Diary

<p><em><strong>Holiday plans are spoiled by a dose of reality.</strong> </em> </p> <p>August is traditionally a time for holidaying, resting, recharging the batteries and cogitating. However, there is always something nagging in the background. Just as I was packing my suitcases with horrific shirts, brightly coloured towels and those dreadful swimming shorts, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that there was an uncompleted questionnaire lying on my study desk about the future of the Bar. </p>

<p><em><strong>There comes a time when each person must decide where loyalties lie.</strong> </em> </p> <p>“No doubt he will pursue the case with the added bitterness of an old friend.” </p> <p>Oscar Wilde of Edward Carson QC, MP. </p>

<p><em><strong>As a child I was given a short book written by the late Mr Justice Darling – a man who was known for his judicial wit, although his Spy pen-portrait bore the unkind legend “Judicial Lightweight”. I had high hopes of this book of legal gems. Alas, it was the dullest book I ever read with all his anecdotes, quips and aphorisms falling flat. It now lives in our lavatory for what my dear mama, when we were little, used to call “struggles”.</strong> </em> </p> <p>Darling is not alone, however. With noble exceptions, the written anecdotes of lawyers are deeply dull. The reason is that we live in an oral tradition, whatever those civil practitioners and sillies who dreamt up the Criminal Procedural Rules think: a world where stories are told and retold in robing rooms, chambers and wine bars. A very great character in Silk when I was a young barrister, called Barry, despite it being none of his given names nor any recognised foreshortening of them, once paid me the honour of telling me the story I had told him six hours earlier about a case of mine but with Barry now in the title role – quite oblivious of the irony. The characters in these stories come to life because we knew them or know them still or, at the least, knew or know of them. </p>

<p><strong>The Calm Before The Storm</strong> </p> <p><em><strong>Despite initial skirmishes, the phoney war between the publicly funded Bar and the Ministry of “Justice” continues while we wait for the real conflict to begin. Is the Public Defender scheme the plan B of which my mandarin friend warned me or is it yet another smokescreen to cover even more awful shenanigans deep in the Whitehall bunker? Andrew, our Senior Clerk, who hides a twitchy personality under a mask of assurance and confidence, came upstairs for our weekly Headmaster’s chat. It had long ago ceased to be enjoyable and now is simply a list of actual, putative, impending or imaginary crises.</strong> </em> </p> <p>  </p> <p>  </p>