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I'm not actually advocating any particular position on this - i'm just curious, as a criminal barrister, how much people think the value we bring to society is worth ;)
carson-
I'm not actually advocating any particular position on this - i'm just curious, as a criminal barrister, how much people think the value we bring to society is worth ;)
For me, using yout £100k figure, if all 16k barristers in the country were doing legal aid work and being paid £1.6bn of public money, that would be public money well spent.
£1.6bn = 5mi of HS2 track. I'm sure they could find it somewhere.
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The value to society is immense. The monetary value is obviously the sticking point. There used to be a published document in NI showing what legal professionals earned each year via legal aid. I found some of the figures astounding - from memory, top earner wasn’t far off £1,000,000 and their wife was in the top five with over £500,000. I would like to think was hard earned.
Not sure if the list is still published.Edit. This is a news story but not recent.
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I'm not actually advocating any particular position on this
Then why are you using ridiculous comparisons like Harley Street consultants? People on legal aid aren't seeing the likes of Peter Carter-Ruck defending them.
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i'm just curious, as a criminal barrister
You're really coming across kind of a dick here but maybe it's just your
naturalhard-earned barrister skillzWas it really necessary to take the opposing position just to wind up half the thread?
Stonehedge
TGR
itsbruce
hoefla
Your perception of the earnings of criminal barristers is delusional. In the most successful commercial chambers junior barristers can start their career earning as much as £70K. In criminal or family law sets, that'll be less than £20K, sometimes as little as £12K. Attrition over the last decade has been big and is growing.
The defunding doesn't just affect barrister's wages; many courthouses have been denied enough funds to be open 5 days a week, which slows down cases while also being a hidden way to reduce the money paid to barristers. I could go on, but I doubt it's going to stop you doing your thing. After all, so many criminal barristers are telling you how it really is.