The Off Topic Topic

[Sheilbh]

Really good piece on the weirdness of barristers' clerks:
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-exquisitely-english-and-amazingly-lucrative-world-of-london-clerks?utm_source=pocket-newtab-global-en-GB

The Exquisitely English (and Amazingly Lucrative) World of London Clerks
It's a Dickensian profession that can still pay upwards of $650,000 per year.
    Simon Akam


Alex Taylor of Fountain Court Chambers. Photographer: Nick Ballon for Bloomberg Businessweek.

At Fountain Court Chambers in central London, the senior clerk is called Alex Taylor. A trim, bald 54-year-old who favors Italian suiting, Taylor isn't actually named Alex. Traditionally in English law, should a newly hired clerk have the same Christian name as an existing member of the staff, he's given a new one, allegedly to avoid confusion on the telephone. During his career, Taylor has been through no fewer than three names. His birth certificate reads "Mark." When he first got to Fountain Court in 1979, the presence of another Mark saw him renamed John. Taylor remained a John through moves to two other chambers. Upon returning to Fountain Court, in 2008, he became Alex. At home his wife still calls him Mark.

Alex/John/Mark Taylor belongs to one of the last surviving professions of Dickensian London. Clerks have co-existed with chimney sweeps and gene splicers. It's a trade that one can enter as a teenager, with no formal qualifications, and that's astonishingly well-paid. A senior clerk can earn a half-million pounds per year, or more than $650,000, and some who are especially entrenched make far more.

Clerks—pronounced "clarks"—have no equivalent in the U.S. legal system, and have nothing in common with the Ivy League–trained Supreme Court aides of the same spelling. They exist because in England and Wales, to simplify a bit, the role of lawyer is divided in two: There are solicitors, who provide legal advice from their offices, and there are barristers, who argue in court. Barristers get the majority of their business via solicitors, and clerks act as the crucial middlemen between the tribes—they work for and sell the services of their barristers, steering inquiring solicitors to the right man or woman.

Clerks are by their own cheerful admission "wheeler-dealers," what Americans might call hustlers. They take a certain pride in managing the careers of their bosses, the barristers—a breed that often combines academic brilliance with emotional fragility. Many barristers regard clerks as their pimps. Some, particularly at the junior end of the profession, live in terror of clerks. The power dynamic is baroque and deeply English, with a naked class divide seen in few other places on the planet. Barristers employ clerks, but a bad relationship can strangle their supply of cases. In his 1861 novel Orley Farm, Anthony Trollope described a barrister's clerk as a man who "looked down from a considerable altitude on some men who from their professional rank might have been considered as his superiors."

...

[The Brain]

Clerks have co-existed with chimney sweeps and gene splicers.

Isn't that true of all contemporary professions?

[Sheilbh]

Clerks have co-existed with chimney sweeps and gene splicers.

Isn't that true of all contemporary professions?

Yeah - I mean also there are still chimney sweeps. Admittedly they're not just children with a cloth any more

[PDH]

Are they lovable scamps unable to do a cockney accent?

[Eddie Teach]

Afaiac, Van Dyke defined the Cockney accent. 

[Razgovory]

I got my little kitty, Sally, a little over two months ago.  She has grown quickly since then and is now about to flood New Orleans.  She's such a good cat.

[The Brain]

Clerks have co-existed with chimney sweeps and gene splicers.

Isn't that true of all contemporary professions?

Yeah - I mean also there are still chimney sweeps. Admittedly they're not just children with a cloth any more

Are they still a staple of music hall? I May Be A Tiny Chimney Sweep But I Carry An Enormous Brush?

[Josquius]

So American lawyers have to spend half their time hunting  for their own work?

[Zanza]

What is the benefit of splitting legal work between solicitors and barristers? 

By the way, if it is so lucrative, maybe Dominic Cummings can sponsor a tech start up that cuts out the middlemen by directly bringing providers and consumers of these services together..

[The Brain]

What is the benefit of splitting legal work between solicitors and barristers?

$650,000 per year.

[Sheilbh]

What is the benefit of splitting legal work between solicitors and barristers? 

To be honest I'm not sure because it's not really my area. I think there is value in the "cab rank" rule which applies to barristers and means that basically barristers are required to accept all instructions in their area if they can (so there's probably some fiddling of timetables or if there's a conflict it doesn't apply) - so regardless of the identity of the client, or the sensitivity of the issue, or what they think of the client. If someone is willing to pay, then they have to act. Solicitors, I think, are more like other businesses and can turn clients down, for example for reputational reasons.

Connected to that in a national legal market like the UK, or Germany, it's probably possible for a big business to give work to most of the big law firms - especially ones with strong litigation teams. Even if there's not an actual conflict, it's likely that they will make those firms agree not to act against them. It's far more difficult to conflict out every possible QC who could act against you. There'll probably be some who can make a very healthy living being conflict free against, say, the big banks or Volkswagen or the tech companies while if you're a lawfirm that does litigation, and employment law, and corporate, and commercial contracts you would far rather do work in all of those areas for one of those companies than just stay conflict free for the litigation against them.

There's probably also some benefit in the expertise and objectivity of barristers whose clients are law firms, rather than the ultimate client. Ireland takes this even further so barristers cannot be employed by law firms or I think in-house because it compromises their independence.

By the way, if it is so lucrative, maybe Dominic Cummings can sponsor a tech start up that cuts out the middlemen by directly bringing providers and consumers of these services together..

You don't need to go this route, people can directly go to barristers if they want (and the barristers accept that sort of thing) but I wouldn't recommend it. Also there's no longer a strict split, so solicitors can do a course and get rights to be advocates (solicitor-advocates) but it's still quite rare.

[Sheilbh]

Switzerland joining Austria in massively expanding their night train network


Edit: Should be done by 2024 - I think Barcelona, Leipzig, Dresden, Amsterdam and Rome are all new.

[Syt]

Considering that I can't sleep in vehicles, this is of limited use to me. Some of my most miserable journeys were on a night train from Vienna to Leipzig and back and Vienna/Hamburg and back without being able to sleep, while not being able to do anything productive either. It was before smartphones with audiobooks were widespread.

[Sheilbh]

Considering that I can't sleep in vehicles, this is of limited use to me. Some of my most miserable journeys were on a night train from Vienna to Leipzig and back and Vienna/Hamburg and back without being able to sleep, while not being able to do anything productive either. It was before smartphones with audiobooks were widespread.

I love night trains - I used to use the Caledonian Sleeper to Scotland pretty regularly (it has since been ruined by the new operator which is something I am unreasonably angry about ), also Paris-Berlin when that line was still running and a fair few lengthy night (or night plus) trips on Ukrainian Railways which were interesting experiences

But I sleep very easily anywhere in any circumstance - I get that if you can't sleep it'd be a bit of a nightmare. I am just very happy because I love them but also I think they are better for someone like me who does want to cut down my flights. Annoyingly, due to very important fire safety reasons we can't have night trains through the Eurotunnel, but I hope that SNCF or someone sets up a hub for night trains from Lille.

[Admiral Yi]

I've only ridden a night train once, from Marseilles to Paris, and I managed to sleep though it wasn't the best sleep.  I probably slept better on normal trains during my Eurailpass blitz.