The Judiciary and the Ministry of Justice have pushed back against reports that court staff were told to hand over striker names to Justice Secretary Dominic Raab “following” a memo from the Lord Chief Justice.
According to reports from the Law Gazette and run by City A.M. this morning, Crown court clerks have been asked to capture absent counsel members and send them to the Lord Chancellor.
However, a MoJ spokesperson has since told City A.M.: “It is categorically untrue that the Justice Secretary has requested the names of any lawyers.
“We are monitoring the number of disrupted cases due to strike action by the Criminal Bar Association to assess the impact on the justice system.”
It has also been confirmed by the Judiciary that there is actually no connection between the Lord Chief Justice’s note to judges asking them to send names of non-attending barristers to the Senior Presiding Judge, and an instruction to court staff to send data on barristers and cases to the Ministry of Justice
Data collected by court staff for judges is never passed to the Government. Judges are independent.
This week marked the beginning of four-week long strikes undertaken by criminal barristers over legal aid fees.
They’re calling for a 25 per cent pay rise, compared to the 15 per cent offered.
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