Judges will have to take charge of cases from the cradle to the grave if the Woolf reforms are ever to deliver their full potential, a gathering of top litigators, advocates and judges heard last week.

A ‘docket’ system for judges, similar to the one used in many US jurisdictions, was among a number of reform proposals that emerged during a high-level gathering of senior legal figures at the Legal Week Litigation Forum in London on 20 September.