Up with the lark; down with the nightingale - Justice Jaded

Where is justice done? When is justice done?  These are two questions that almost never get asked as being peripheral to the main and only question: Is justice done?  However they are essential questions when considered in light of Her Majesty's Courts & Tribunals Service's (HMCTS) proposed Flexible Operating Hours for courts.  A pilot scheme proposed for London and elsewhere will see some courts sitting as early as 0800 and some sitting as late as 2030.  

It is clear from this proposal that in the mind of HMCTS justice is done in a courtroom (where) and only as that court is sitting (when).  If true it must conversely be the case that at no time and in no place outside the courtroom is justice being done.  This is nonsense.

Barristers go to court but they don't prepare in courtrooms they prepare in offices (chambers) equally judges don't prepare in courtrooms they prepare in their offices (chambers).  When barristers and judges are in court they can't at the same time be in their chambers preparing.  The other place they can't be is at their homes with their family and children.  If I sound like an idiot pointing this out it is because it is an idiotic thing to have to point out.

At the moment the vast majority of Crown Courts and Magistrates' Courts sit between 1000 and 1615 with an hour break for lunch between 1300-1400.  If there is a trial going on the court will sit in the morning and rise in the afternoon.  This is not good enough for HMCTS.  HMCTS feels that more justice can be squeezed into one court in one day like putting more toothpaste in the tube.  The plan is that every courtroom will sit twice in a day.  Early morning to lunch.  Early afternoon to supper.  One day twice as much justice. 

The best bit is that it's flexible and of course that's what we all want in our lives: flexibility.  However flexibility is only flexible when it's on your terms.  When flexibility is imposed on you that is something else; it's called inflexibility.  We are creatures of habit.  The Bar is a catastrophic profession for cultivating good habits.  Every day is a nightmare of unpredictability every personal life a litany of missed weddings, funerals, nativity plays and faltering emotional connection with a loved one.

During the constant professional earthquake that is preparing for stressful and difficult trials one small point of certainty is that there will be some (not much) time at the start of theday and some (not much) time at the end for preparation and having a life.  Justice being worked on outside the courtroom so that injustice is avoided inside the courtroom.

If your instinct is that the Bar should shut up and suck it up on this becase everyone else is working 24/7 zero hours contracts reflect of this analogy.  You are about to go in for major life saving cancer surgery.  Now find out that your surgeon is having a childcare crisis at home because the hospital has scheduled your operation to begin an hour before her childminder arrives.  Now find out that your surgeon does not even know your name and hasn't read any of your notes because the surgery he was performing the previous day didn't finish until 2000 and he had a two hour journey to get home and he hasn't slept.

The Bar Council has published a Protocol for Court Sitting Hours. Read it  and support it: otherwise you'll be the one bending over backwards.