Barristers’ strike: who is ultimately to blame for court ‘chaos’?

 A continuous all-out strike by criminal barristers is set to bring the justice system grinding to a halt in England and Wales from this week.

Members of the Criminal Bar Association (CBA) have been walking out on alternate weeks since June and have voted to begin an uninterrupted strike from 5 September. The strike effectively begins today, however, because of the pattern of week-on, week-off industrial action.

Are the strikes justified?

Barristers working on criminal cases say they been hit by deep cuts to their incomes as a result of government changes to the legal aid system.

A growing number are quitting the sector, leading to “legal aid deserts”, said The Law Society. And many of those who remain say they can no longer survive on their current salaries.

Although private corporate lawyers are well paid, criminal barristers “are not paid as well as many people assume”, The Guardian said. 

The median salary for a criminal barrister in 2019-20 was £79,800, according to an independent review conducted by Sir Christopher Bellamy QC. And barristers with two years of practice or fewer were paid a median of £25,100 before expenses and a net figure of £18,800 after expenses.

Newly qualified criminal barristers “can take home as little as £9,000 once costs, including transport, are factored in”. Some barristers say they are paid less than the minimum wage after all their time working on cases is taken into account.

What is the government offering?

 A 15% rise in fees has been offered by the government. But the CBA said the increase, which was the minimum recommended by the criminal legal aid review, was not enough because it does not kick in immediately or apply to existing cases.

Barristers are asking for a 25% increase in the fees they are awarded when defendants cannot otherwise afford a lawyer.

The Ministry of Justice has previously said it had “repeatedly explained” to the CBA that backdating pay would require a “fundamental change” in how fees are paid, adding: “That reform would cost a disproportionate amount of taxpayers’ money and would take longer to implement, meaning barristers would have to wait longer for payment.”

Who is to blame for the strikes?

Labour leader Keir Starmer last week accused the government of doing “absolutely nothing” to resolve industrial disputes as it emerged that Justice Secretary Dominic Raab was on holiday when the CBA voted for its indefinite strike.

Article source: https://www.theweek.co.uk/strikes/957787/barristers-strike-who-responsible-court-chaos