According to an HM Courts & Tribunals Service spokeswoman the impact of today’s action was ‘limited and manageable’ – 98% of listed magistrates’ courtrooms sat, as did 71% of Crown courtrooms.
As a barrister I aim to undermine false assertions with forensic skill and questioning. Teasing out information that demonstrates something is not quite right with a fact or a conclusion. Often such advocacy will be subtle and require the development of a nuanced argument.
So how do I approach the assertion that 71% of Crown Court courtrooms sat with the strike having “limited impact”?
Utter bollocks.
I need say no more.
A view from the North 
I’d say that that was a major admission on the MoJ’s part. If, out of the listed sittings, only those percentages actually sat, that’s horrendous. I took the liberty of grabbing the listings pages of about 10 northern Crown Courts yesterday. I might post them somewhere. “Court Not Sitting” is what is written for the vast majority. The remaining ones were matters for which people were most likely unrepresented (like appeals against magistrates’ sentences and drug order reviews where counsel never appear).
Grayling must now take a message from the Bar and solicitors. The clouds gathered on 6th Jan. It started to rain today. Now, there’s a storm coming. You will not survive this.
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The CBA have ALL the information on Crown Courts sitting today. I monitored a court centre in Sussex – the part heard trials in all 4 courts did not sit – a multi-handed murder, a rape, a two handed GBH and a kidnapping. All 3 of the Courts sitting had hearings listed but the total sitting times from all 3 were about 3 hours – all could have been heard in one court along with the two ineffective hearings from the other court centre which had two PCMH;’s listed – one in each court! So that’s 6 courts sitting for a grand total of 3 hours 10 minutes between them. How’s that for a bit of dishonesty about how many courts sat – essentially they spread out a handful of hearings over 6 court rooms. BTW if it hadn’t been for the fact that the trial listed in one of those courts was an unrepresented defendant (who has always been unrepresented) the total sitting time would have been down to about an hour!! Apart from the trial all other hearings were ineffective due to non-attendance of Counsel/solicitors. That’s the TRUTH!!
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Sorry forgot to say that the list yesterday was massive – that’s what you get for giving too much notice of hearings…
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Obvs I didn’t mean hearings – it’s been a long day!
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OK Jaime – yours was far shorter than mine, and a more entertaining read!
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I made a point, you proved it!
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