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He’s Fucking Marvellous!: The Fall and Rise of Barristers’ Clerks

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Barristers typically rely on a type of consigliere called the barrister’s clerk who carries out a number of tasks for them. John Flood suggests the clerk defines the dividing line between the sacred area of the law and the profane world of money and clients.

Image courtesy of interviewee. April 11, 2024

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This video video discusses the role of barristers and their clerks in the legal system, particularly within the context of chambers. Barristers typically form groups called chambers, where they share expenses but keep their profits. Clerks play a crucial role in managing barristers’ schedules, negotiating fees, and assisting in their careers, often acting as intermediaries between barristers and solicitors.

The speaker emphasizes the traditional dynamics of the profession, including the hierarchical status among barristers and the clerks' important role in navigating legal networks and relationships. Historically, clerks often lacked formal training, relying instead on practical experience and street smarts to manage their roles effectively.

This video video also contrasts the modern clerking role, which incorporates more technology and specialization, with older practices where clerks tended to handle more mundane tasks for barristers. It highlights the division in legal work funding—private versus legal aid—which affects the quality of representation provided to different clients. The current trend shows a growing disparity between corporate legal services and those catering to individuals, leading to a more mechanized approach to criminal work.

Finally, the speaker believes that clerks will continue to be integral to the barrister profession as long as the traditional bar structure exists, rejecting the idea that they will be entirely replaced by office staff. Their blend of financial acumen and understanding of personal dynamics with barristers remain essential in the legal field.

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X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

00:00.415 --> 00:01.905
That is a great question,

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and it's one which I sort of

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stumbled across when I was a student.

00:06.805 --> 00:11.265
And, I, I came across these people in,

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in a lecture and I thought, what are they?

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It make sense, you know, in a modern world.

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So essentially, you know,

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barristers formed themselves into what they call chambers.

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These are not offices or firms in the sense that you

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and I understand if you like.

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They are collections of individuals who come together

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and they share expenses, they keep their profits,

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but they have what they call,

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again, another traditional name.

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Somebody who's called a Clark, Paris' Clark, who has

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two, possibly three jobs.

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One is to, manage their diaries,

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make sure they're in the right court at the right time,

00:45.085 --> 00:46.425
in the right place, that sort of thing.

00:46.645 --> 00:50.065
The other is to negotiate their fees, and,

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and the third one, is

00:52.305 --> 00:55.185
to manage their careers for them as well.

00:56.325 --> 00:57.825
Um, and,

00:57.965 --> 01:00.825
and so what you've gotta understand, if you think

01:00.825 --> 01:05.225
of the barrister as a kind of priest, somebody who is,

01:05.645 --> 01:08.945
dealing with the holy virtues of the law,

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who's not thinking about Luca money

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and all that kind of stuff,

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but, you know, sort of higher thoughts if you like.

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Somebody then has to take care of the,

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the more mundane matters that that come into play.

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Money and rewards and status and all those sorts of things.

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And this is the Clark's job.

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Most clerks, they, they've changed a bit now, were

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sort of school graduates, never gone to university.

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Um, they often had connections with other people

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who were clerks and they were sort

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of brought in as Tea Boys.

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And they learned by doing the job, they kind of, it was kind

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of an apprenticeship,

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and they would follow the senior clerk around and so on.

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Um, and, and, and, and, and there was no formal training

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or qualification or anything like that.

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Street smarts. It was purely about street smarts,

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understanding networks, how, you know,

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the solicitors are working, how the other co barristers

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chambers are working and so on,

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and how the courts are working

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and being tied into all of these networks

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and being able to manipulate the, the web of the networks,

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if you like, in order to get advantage.

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So let's say, you know, a case comes into chambers,

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everybody's busy.

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You can't do it. So you've gotta give the

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case away to somebody else.

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Who do you give it to? Now?

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Somebody might owe you a favor or you owe somebody a

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favor, you give it to them.

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That means then ties that link even tighter.

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Uh, so they're doing it to you as well.

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So you end up with this kind of reciprocal set of links

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and obligations, a favorite bank, if you like,

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that's spread throughout.

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Uh, and everybody knows everybody 'cause it's so small.

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I mean, they all go drinking on a Friday night in the,

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in the local pub, which is where I used

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to spend half my time when I was doing the research as well,

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because, you know, go where they go.

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That was the nature of the research.

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Uh, and, and, and, and they're very canny.

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Uh, and they understand the

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Status. I'll give you,

02:59.795 --> 03:03.805
something one Clark said

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to me that sort of summarized the whole thing in a way.

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He, he said, look, you know, when I'm teaching Junior Clarks

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how to deal with barristers, I, I, I tell him this.

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He said, when I call a barrister by his first name, John,

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he said, you will call him Mr. Smith.

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Um, when I called him Mr. Smith, you will call him sir,

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when I called him, sir, you won't speak to him.

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Uh, and, and, and,

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and it just sort of, you know, it, it, it was like a haiku.

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It sort of summarized that, that status hierarchy,

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so elegantly, so simply, so simply,

03:39.115 --> 03:40.165
that, you know, I thought, yeah,

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this is what's, what's going on.

03:42.105 --> 03:45.045
Uh, and Clarks had a tra tradition

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of doing everything for their brows.

03:46.725 --> 03:48.645
They sew on, they sew up their zips.

03:48.645 --> 03:50.565
They, you know, repair them, clean their shoes,

03:50.595 --> 03:53.165
make sure they had proper bands for their shirts

03:53.185 --> 03:54.685
and things like that, and so on.

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They would just look after them.

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It'd be like a, you know, the transformation

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of a nanny from home into work

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to some extent if you, if you like.

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Now, it's not quite like that anymore.

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It's much, it's a bit more modern clerks are, are, are,

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are more automated.

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They, they, you know,

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they're using technology more and so on.

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But there's still essentially at, at the quintes essence of

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what they're doing is the same sort of thing, if you like.

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They're dealing with the money and the time and so on.

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There were a couple of things, around that.

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Um, and I go back to what I said about the, the,

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the barrister being of a, a sort of kind of priest,

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if you like, in a, in a way or, or,

04:34.625 --> 04:36.485
or embodying priestly virtues.

04:37.025 --> 04:41.125
Um, now, you know, according to Mary Douglas, you know,

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dirt is matter outta place.

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Um, and, and, and,

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and there's another person I wanna bring in here,

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a sociologist called Everett Hughes from Chicago,

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who coined the phrase that, you know,

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good men doing dirty work, and,

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and the idea is that somebody has to handle

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that matter out of place, if you like, and,

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and create this.

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And to provide a barrier, an installation between

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the higher virtues of law

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and the lower, elements of,

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Luca and money and career,

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and status and things like that.

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So it was an attempt to sort

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of locate these different care areas of work, according

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to kind of where they would fit, if you like, in our,

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in our sense of, in our notion of what is good,

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what is clean, what is holy,

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and as to what is taboo, dirty,

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and unclean, if you like, in that kind of way.

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And, and, you know, we have a way of sort of, you know,

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symbolizing those things, which is what, you know,

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the wig, for example, symbolizes somebody who's of a

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Higher status in that kind of way.

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The gown, and, and,

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and, you know, it just reinforces these

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divisions all the time.

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It's class status, esteem and money can be too.

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I think one of the things which has really happened probably

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since I've been doing research on the,

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on the legal profession is the division now between

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what you might call privately funded work

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and legal aid funded work.

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And that basically means,

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civil and criminal.

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So criminal is entirely run on, on legal aid,

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and that that puts it under the government control

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because they set the rates,

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how much people are gonna be paid and so on.

06:36.185 --> 06:37.765
And as you probably know, you know,

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they've been reducing the rates, which has led to strikes

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by, by barristers, over the last couple of years.

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And, and it's becoming quite dire.

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'cause it means people aren't getting the proper

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representation they should.

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If you are a corporation or business

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and so on, then you know, the world is your oystery.

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You've got access to, to the best

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brains and people like that.

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I mean, to give you a an example when, Barovsky sued,

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Roman Abramovich in, in one of those first oligarch,

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pieces of litigation, Abramovich is,

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barrister man by the name of Jonathan Sump, who went

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to the Supreme Court, who's now retired, was asked to go

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to the Supreme Court and he said,

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can I wait till the case is over?

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Uh, and they said, well, really, you should go now.

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He said, well, I had, I had to do that.

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I have had the feedback and I'd rather take it through.

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So they let him take it through.

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And then afterwards, there's a lot of,

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you know, how much did he get?

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Uh, and it's reckoned, he probably got somewhere

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around about 8 million pounds for,

07:39.135 --> 07:40.315
running that case.

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Russians pay a lot. They, they, they're great clients.

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Uh, the Clarks always talked about the Russian premium.

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As soon as you had a Russian walking through the door,

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the fee went up at least 30%.

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Uh, and,

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and so, you know, it's understanding those sorts of things.

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So, you know, the corporate side gets the best the client

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can demand, the best they get the best in, in that kind

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of way, whether it's, the big city law firms,

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whether it's the best barristers,

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where it's the best arbitrators, whatever it is, they can,

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they can really get it and they can afford it.

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Um, if you are, you know, somebody who's,

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up in the magistrates court, on a charge

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for maybe shoplifting or something like

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that, it's very difficult.

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You'll be pressured into getting a plea bargain.

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Uh, you end up with a record and,

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and everybody just walk away and you are left, alone.

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And so I think that's really,

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where we're finding the big distinction now.

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And so what you are finding is there are

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factories appearing.

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So we have factories of solicitors, factories of barristers

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to some extent, that handle criminal work.

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They've got the systems, they've got the,

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know-how they know how to deal with the finances.

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They know how to distribute people around the country,

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in, in that way. And that's

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Really what is now happening, if you like.

08:56.835 --> 08:59.765
Whereas the other side, the corporate side, is more bespoke.

09:00.115 --> 09:01.685
It's, does it suit yourself?

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Would you like to see in a bit more, and,

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and a bit more,

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tailored towards the individual's requirements?

09:08.165 --> 09:09.245
So we are ending up with two different,

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with two systems quite separate in a way.

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And, and what you're finding is that Clarks tend

09:14.165 --> 09:17.205
to now specialize in one or the other,

09:17.225 --> 09:19.085
and they become very expert indeed, in,

09:19.225 --> 09:20.765
in managing these situations.

09:21.555 --> 09:24.125
Well, you know, I I, I always thought they would kind

09:24.125 --> 09:26.365
of disappear, in a way,

09:26.665 --> 09:28.165
but I'm, I'm no longer, so, sure.

09:28.465 --> 09:29.725
You know, when the Clarks,

09:29.755 --> 09:32.805
when I started doing research on the Clarks a long time ago,

09:33.225 --> 09:35.565
the clerks used to get a percentage

09:35.705 --> 09:37.125
of the barristers brief fees.

09:37.125 --> 09:39.805
This is how they paid. So they get about 10%,

09:39.805 --> 09:41.005
7%, something like that.

09:41.065 --> 09:42.605
So if you were to really, I mean,

09:42.645 --> 09:45.165
I knew one Clark back in the, nineties,

09:45.265 --> 09:47.565
he was making over half a million pounds a year back then,

09:47.625 --> 09:50.405
you know, 'cause, his, his barristers were so good.

09:50.785 --> 09:52.925
Uh, others didn't make quite so much,

09:52.945 --> 09:54.845
but, you know, it was a strong incentive to sort

09:54.845 --> 09:57.485
of push the business through the,

09:57.625 --> 09:58.765
the chambers if you like.

09:59.145 --> 10:00.485
Um, and,

10:00.505 --> 10:03.485
and so I thought they would just become kind of office

10:04.445 --> 10:07.205
functionaries, you know, a CEO practice director,

10:07.435 --> 10:09.125
technical officer, and things like that.

10:09.305 --> 10:11.245
You get those down changes, you know, you have

10:11.245 --> 10:12.765
to have all of that kind of stuff.

10:13.145 --> 10:15.805
But you still need somebody who knows how to deal

10:15.805 --> 10:18.005
with the personality of the barrister,

10:18.425 --> 10:19.885
how they want to see their career.

10:20.355 --> 10:23.045
They've got to manage those solicitor's expectations

10:23.105 --> 10:24.565
and demands and things like that.

10:24.825 --> 10:26.445
So they've gotta be really good at psychology.

10:26.445 --> 10:28.645
They're not psychologists trained in a formal sense,

10:28.985 --> 10:32.005
but they understand that kind of psychology, if you like.

10:32.195 --> 10:35.205
They need a, a good financial nouse as well in order

10:35.225 --> 10:39.205
to work out the, the, the right kind of fee and so on.

10:39.425 --> 10:42.245
So, my, you know,

10:42.685 --> 10:45.405
I actually think now they're gonna continue, as long

10:45.405 --> 10:47.765
as the, the bar exists,

10:47.785 --> 10:48.965
and doesn't combine with sisters.

10:49.065 --> 10:50.525
And I don't really see that happening here.

10:50.945 --> 10:53.085
The Clark will be there.

00:00 - That is a great question, and it's one which I sort of stumbled across when I was a student. And, I, I came across these people in, in a lecture and I thought, what are they? It make sense, you know, in a modern world.

00:16 - So essentially, you know, barristers formed themselves into what they call chambers. These are not offices or firms in the sense that you and I understand if you like. They are collections of individuals who come together and they share expenses, they keep their profits, but they have what they call, again, another traditional name. Somebody who's called a Clark, Paris' Clark, who has two, possibly three jobs.

00:40 - One is to, manage their diaries, make sure they're in the right court at the right time, in the right place, that sort of thing. The other is to negotiate their fees, and, and the third one, is to manage their careers for them as well. and, and so what you've gotta understand, if you think of the barrister as a kind of priest, somebody who is, dealing with the holy virtues of the law,

01:09 - who's not thinking about Luca money and all that kind of stuff, but, you know, sort of higher thoughts if you like. Somebody then has to take care of the, the more mundane matters that that come into play. Money and rewards and status and all those sorts of things. And this is the Clark's job. Most clerks, they, they've changed a bit now, were sort of school graduates, never gone to university. they often had connections with other people

01:36 - who were clerks and they were sort of brought in as Tea Boys. And they learned by doing the job, they kind of, it was kind of an apprenticeship, and they would follow the senior clerk around and so on. and, and, and, and, and there was no formal training or qualification or anything like that. Street smarts. It was purely about street smarts, understanding networks, how, you know, the solicitors are working, how the other co barristers

02:00 - chambers are working and so on, and how the courts are working and being tied into all of these networks and being able to manipulate the, the web of the networks, if you like, in order to get advantage. So let's say, you know, a case comes into chambers, everybody's busy. You can't do it. So you've gotta give the case away to somebody else. Who do you give it to? Now?

02:22 - Somebody might owe you a favor or you owe somebody a favor, you give it to them. That means then ties that link even tighter. so they're doing it to you as well. So you end up with this kind of reciprocal set of links and obligations, a favorite bank, if you like, that's spread throughout. and everybody knows everybody 'cause it's so small. I mean, they all go drinking on a Friday night in the, in the local pub, which is where I used

02:46 - to spend half my time when I was doing the research as well, because, you know, go where they go. That was the nature of the research. and, and, and, and they're very canny. and they understand the Status. I'll give you, something one Clark said to me that sort of summarized the whole thing in a way. He, he said, look, you know, when I'm teaching Junior Clarks how to deal with barristers, I, I, I tell him this.

03:12 - He said, when I call a barrister by his first name, John, he said, you will call him Mr. Smith. when I called him Mr. Smith, you will call him sir, when I called him, sir, you won't speak to him. and, and, and, and it just sort of, you know, it, it, it was like a haiku. It sort of summarized that, that status hierarchy, so elegantly, so simply, so simply, that, you know, I thought, yeah, this is what's, what's going on.

03:42 - and Clarks had a tra tradition of doing everything for their brows. They sew on, they sew up their zips. They, you know, repair them, clean their shoes, make sure they had proper bands for their shirts and things like that, and so on. They would just look after them. It'd be like a, you know, the transformation of a nanny from home into work to some extent if you, if you like.

04:02 - Now, it's not quite like that anymore. It's much, it's a bit more modern clerks are, are, are, are more automated. They, they, you know, they're using technology more and so on. But there's still essentially at, at the quintes essence of what they're doing is the same sort of thing, if you like. They're dealing with the money and the time and so on. There were a couple of things, around that. and I go back to what I said about the, the,

04:28 - the barrister being of a, a sort of kind of priest, if you like, in a, in a way or, or, or embodying priestly virtues. now, you know, according to Mary Douglas, you know, dirt is matter outta place. and, and, and, and there's another person I wanna bring in here, a sociologist called Everett Hughes from Chicago, who coined the phrase that, you know, good men doing dirty work, and,

04:59 - and the idea is that somebody has to handle that matter out of place, if you like, and, and create this. And to provide a barrier, an installation between the higher virtues of law and the lower, elements of, Luca and money and career, and status and things like that. So it was an attempt to sort of locate these different care areas of work, according

05:32 - to kind of where they would fit, if you like, in our, in our sense of, in our notion of what is good, what is clean, what is holy, and as to what is taboo, dirty, and unclean, if you like, in that kind of way. And, and, you know, we have a way of sort of, you know, symbolizing those things, which is what, you know, the wig, for example, symbolizes somebody who's of a Higher status in that kind of way. The gown, and, and,

06:00 - and, you know, it just reinforces these divisions all the time. It's class status, esteem and money can be too. I think one of the things which has really happened probably since I've been doing research on the, on the legal profession is the division now between what you might call privately funded work and legal aid funded work. And that basically means, civil and criminal.

06:26 - So criminal is entirely run on, on legal aid, and that that puts it under the government control because they set the rates, how much people are gonna be paid and so on. And as you probably know, you know, they've been reducing the rates, which has led to strikes by, by barristers, over the last couple of years. And, and it's becoming quite dire. 'cause it means people aren't getting the proper representation they should.

06:49 - If you are a corporation or business and so on, then you know, the world is your oystery. You've got access to, to the best brains and people like that. I mean, to give you a an example when, Barovsky sued, Roman Abramovich in, in one of those first oligarch, pieces of litigation, Abramovich is, barrister man by the name of Jonathan Sump, who went to the Supreme Court, who's now retired, was asked to go to the Supreme Court and he said,

07:19 - can I wait till the case is over? and they said, well, really, you should go now. He said, well, I had, I had to do that. I have had the feedback and I'd rather take it through. So they let him take it through. And then afterwards, there's a lot of, you know, how much did he get? and it's reckoned, he probably got somewhere around about 8 million pounds for, running that case.

07:40 - Russians pay a lot. They, they, they're great clients. the Clarks always talked about the Russian premium. As soon as you had a Russian walking through the door, the fee went up at least 30%. and, and so, you know, it's understanding those sorts of things. So, you know, the corporate side gets the best the client can demand, the best they get the best in, in that kind of way, whether it's, the big city law firms, whether it's the best barristers,

08:07 - where it's the best arbitrators, whatever it is, they can, they can really get it and they can afford it. if you are, you know, somebody who's, up in the magistrates court, on a charge for maybe shoplifting or something like that, it's very difficult. You'll be pressured into getting a plea bargain. you end up with a record and, and everybody just walk away and you are left, alone. And so I think that's really,

08:33 - where we're finding the big distinction now. And so what you are finding is there are factories appearing. So we have factories of solicitors, factories of barristers to some extent, that handle criminal work. They've got the systems, they've got the, know-how they know how to deal with the finances. They know how to distribute people around the country, in, in that way. And that's Really what is now happening, if you like.

08:56 - Whereas the other side, the corporate side, is more bespoke. It's, does it suit yourself? Would you like to see in a bit more, and, and a bit more, tailored towards the individual's requirements? So we are ending up with two different, with two systems quite separate in a way. And, and what you're finding is that Clarks tend to now specialize in one or the other, and they become very expert indeed, in,

09:19 - in managing these situations. Well, you know, I I, I always thought they would kind of disappear, in a way, but I'm, I'm no longer, so, sure. You know, when the Clarks, when I started doing research on the Clarks a long time ago, the clerks used to get a percentage of the barristers brief fees. This is how they paid. So they get about 10%, 7%, something like that.

09:41 - So if you were to really, I mean, I knew one Clark back in the, nineties, he was making over half a million pounds a year back then, you know, 'cause, his, his barristers were so good. others didn't make quite so much, but, you know, it was a strong incentive to sort of push the business through the, the chambers if you like. and, and so I thought they would just become kind of office

10:04 - functionaries, you know, a CEO practice director, technical officer, and things like that. You get those down changes, you know, you have to have all of that kind of stuff. But you still need somebody who knows how to deal with the personality of the barrister, how they want to see their career. They've got to manage those solicitor's expectations and demands and things like that. So they've gotta be really good at psychology.

10:26 - They're not psychologists trained in a formal sense, but they understand that kind of psychology, if you like. They need a, a good financial nouse as well in order to work out the, the, the right kind of fee and so on. So, my, you know, I actually think now they're gonna continue, as long as the, the bar exists, and doesn't combine with sisters. And I don't really see that happening here. The Clark will be there.

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