Cast your mind back. In the mid 1980s there was a debate about whether those lacking legal qualifications should be allowed to do conveyancing. An argument was advanced by solicitors to justify what had come to be known as ‘the conveyancing monopoly’. Solicitors, it was said, needed the revenue from conveyancing work to subsidise the litigation work they did for the needy. It was an unattractive argument. Rightly, the public did not buy it.
Nowadays, one sees much the same arguments over solicitor-advocacy. Only two weeks ago one City firm was reportedly criticised by a High Court judge for having a policy of not instructing junior counsel, but performing the junior counsel function in-house. It was said that this kind of approach was depriving the Bar of its future silks.
