Below is an open letter published by five junior criminal practitioners in relation to the new Advocates Graduated Fee Scheme (AGFS), which for non-lawyers is the scheme for payment of defence advocates in legally aided criminal cases.
19thNovember 2018
We write in relation to a case which has just collapsed at the Crown Court sitting at Inner London. We write to express our dismay at the remuneration under the new AGFS scheme and the consequences which will now follow.
This was a five handed Conspiracy to Kidnap and Blackmail case and was listed with a four week estimate, due to commence today (19thNovember 2018). All counsel/advocates were instructed at the outset of this case.
The evidence was voluminous to say the least, with near enough 10,000 pages of used and served evidence and all counsel taking approximately 2 weeks out of court on various days to prepare the case for trial. Much of the evidence consisted of telephone transcripts and translated Spanish telephone evidence along with cell site mapping.
Only last week, the Crown disclosed information relating to the complainants character and that he was now refusing to come to court to give evidence. Indeed, he lost contact with the police officers in the case and switched his mobile phone off. This resulted in the crown applying to adduce his evidence under the hearsay provisions.
All defence counsel prepared skeleton arguments outlining their objections to the Crown’s application. These took several hours to research and prepare. There is no (and it should be highlighted, never has been), provision for payment for written work under the graduated fee regulations; a fact which in itself is utterly unacceptable.
But even more disgraceful are the rates of pay for such a serious case with thousands of pages of evidence and the fact that this trial has now ‘cracked’. With no provision for payment of Pages of Prosecution Evidence served (PPE), the brief fee is now only £1,105 (being a category 13.1 offence). Had the trial been contested, the brief fee would not have been much better (amounting to only £1,300). Both of these derisory figures amount to a reduction in advocates fees of approximately 80% as compared to the AGFS scheme which existed pre April 2018. Moreover, the above cracked trial fee is the total payment for all preparation in this case, is of course gross and so chambers rent, clerks fees and tax will need to be paid from this amount. To add insult to injury, the four week gap in our diaries now looms large.
It is, quite frankly, an absolute scandal that these new AGFS fees were ever agreed and that criminal barristers are now being expected to work for such derisory rates. Each and every one of us defending in this case is making it clear to you that we will no longer undertake cases which are PPE heavy.
Enough is enough!
Mustapha Hakme (9 Bedford Row)
Zarif Khan (Drystone Chambers)
Archangelo Power (2 Bedford Row)
Paul Firmin
Phillip Hill
Truly scandalous.
Shocking stuff. Why would anyone want to work in criminal law if this is the kind of fee you can expect. I hope your voices are heard.
This shocking example provides very powerful support for CBA urgently resuming negotiations and retrospective action by HMG.
So why do the govt pay the solicitors massive amounts of money to look through the evidence when you suggest that it is in fact the advocates that do the work. Is it fair to pay twice or three times as the CPS have already looked at it and decided on the required evidence – MAYBE we need an independent authority to do this role and supply the CPS and defence with the facts and evidence from a neutral perspective.
Either way complaining about a new system that your own governing body (BC) explicitly wrote to the govt and asked for, based on ‘feedback from all areas of your body, with almost this exact design of scheme – even ignoring the fact that it probably cost govt millions in IT costs.
No doubt the clear inequalities were pointed out to those senior in the bar BUT who would’ve thought that their answer was that the new scheme would ‘spur’ on the junior bar!
So before you blame the govt take a good look at your own industry (and solicitor firms mainly) and the fact you have all bled this stone dry by living off electronic evidence volumes as if they are same as the historic equivalents.