I’m reading - not for the first time -
reported disapproval from the judiciary about the instruction of counsel in
particular circumstances.
It doesn’t really matter from the
point of view of what I have to say but this particular article arises from an
old chestnut of infant settlement hearings.
In passing, there is a separate
observation about that. The court rules
very properly require additional work from lawyers to safeguard the interests of
children even in “small claims”.
I should be interested to know how
many school kids, even in this day and age, think that £1,000 (or just under)
isn’t a lot of money. Nevertheless, the
expectation of the courts seems to be that the additional work will be done for
virtually nothing.
In this and other situations, judges
complain about the “unnecessary use of counsel” and the like. What in heaven’s name is the problem?
By and large, junior counsel attend
many relatively straightforward hearings unaccompanied by solicitors, often
travelling significant distance, and doing it all at unbelievably modest
cost. So many times it works out cheaper
than sending any less qualified person from the office, or from another firm as
an agent.
Encouraged by defendants’
representatives who, in the case of liability insurers, will generally run even
the most tenuous arguments to try and have costs disallowed, our courts seem
blinded by the reference to ‘counsel’.
So often they seem to overlook the obvious point that there has to be some expense and they should
ask the obvious question - how much would that expense have been in any event?
So often the answer will be - a lot
more than it was to “use counsel”.
