Is it time to rethink a career at the criminal bar?

Law students have a lot to think about before pursuing a career at the criminal bar.

Cuts to the legal aid budget that came in with the legal aid, sentencing and punishment of offenders act 2012 (Laspo), reduced the funding available for civil legal aid by £350m.

Further savings, proposed by Chris Grayling, to cut the annual criminal legal aid budget by £220m are currently under consultation. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is expected to give its final response to this at the end of the month.

With cuts now aimed at both civil and criminal aid, it is likely that fewer people in the UK will be able to qualify for quality legal representation and some will not be able to afford any representation at all.

Cases will not vanish but representation will. This will lead to miscarriages of justice, raises questions about the quality of our democracy. It will also force out quality barristers, as without casework funded by legal aid, there will be less work.

Some chambers can no longer function at all. Tooks Chambers, practicing in human and civil rights for 30 years, having worked on landmark cases such as Hillsborough, is now being dissolved. A statement on their website reads: "the dissolution of chambers is the direct result of government policies on legal aid… 90% of our work is publicly funded."

What are lawyers doing about Laspo?

Just about everyone in the legal world is furious about it. They will not be able to refuse governmental legislation. The only hope is to put pressure on the government to make a U-turn.

Calls for a first national strike by barristers were heard during a recent Bar Council meeting as well as a proposal to boycott the government's Global Law Summit next year in an attempt to shame the justice secretary Chris Grayling.

This follows national action by both barristers and solicitors who held a half-day demonstration - the first time this has ever happened and the first time barristers have completely withdrawn their labour in support of a cause.

What does this mean for students?

Chamber sets specialising in criminal law mainly rely on cases funded by legal aid. Without this main source of fee income, many chambers have become economically vulnerable and can no longer back new trainees financially to complete pupillages. For some, funding for 2014 pupillages has been completely withdrawn.

As bleak as it is, there are attempts to try to support newcomers. James Wakefield, the director of the Council of the Inns of Court, says: "Clearly the public bar has come under financial pressure in terms of pupillage fees, and we are keen that talent keeps entering these areas so that applicants are not discouraged."

In what some in the profession are saying is a surprising move, the Inns of Court will now pay 50% of the fees offered to trainees by chambers. Known as the "pupillage matched funding scheme", it will be in place for the first round of pupillage applications in spring 2014 and is meant to encourage chambers to continue to offer pupillages in the short-term.

Wakefield insists that "the lack of opportunities means that where attempts to try and widen access to the bar have been developing, there are now too few opportunities at the public bar to fully qualify as a barrister. The pupillage matched funding scheme would help tackle this specific problem."

Will the "pupillage matched funding scheme" solve the problem?

Sceptics may say that this is a bizarre scheme that will only create a bottleneck later down the line – with less paid work on offer for junior barristers, what good is a pupillage?

Wakefield acknowledges this with a sigh: "The Inns of Court will be reviewing the success of the scheme in a year's time, and may in fact pull the funding if it does not prove to be workable."

But during these uncertain times, holding the door open for new trainees has got to be a good thing – for now at least. For students who've invested in the bar practice training course, there are more options to fully qualify with the pupillage funding scheme in place.

All will not be lost for students hoping to work in criminal, family and civil law. As times are changing, chambers specialising in these areas will of course adapt. Many will attempt to branch out into other areas – for example, criminal sets may pursue more cases in fraud, bribery and regulatory work to pull in the fees.

So junior barristers of the future may likely still find work on offer in criminal, family and civil sectors, yet the underlying warning is that the type of casework may well be less socially rewarding with a different focus from what is has been over the previous years.

(Source: TheGuardian)