Posted: 01 January 2008 at 16:43 | IP Logged

The rules regarding dress in Higher Courts have recently been changed to allow solicitor advocates to wear wigs with effect from 2nd January 2008. The poll question for January 2008 is this, "If you are/were a solicitor advocate would you wear a wig in Higher Courts?"

Posted: 02 January 2008 at 16:35 | IP Logged

Ged Hale sent me this picture of himself standing outside Doncaster Crown Court this morning. Is he the first solicitor advocate to don a wig and appear in the Crown Court under the new practice direction of court dress?

Posted: 03 January 2008 at 04:51 | IP Logged

I will always wear a wig in the Crown Court. I believe we have won an important point of principal and it would make it a hollow victory not to do so.We have the "stuff" gown to differentiate ourselves from the bar and I am the first to admit that our skills will take some honing to achieve the levels acquired by our "learned friends", we will get there and wearing a wig is the first step towards showing them we are here and here to stay.

The photograph outside the Doncaster Crown Court is a "one off" to promote the success of solicitors nationwide in terms of the perception of parity that the average juror will now have. No more notes to the judge equiring about the un wigged advocate.

Wear your wig as a badge of honour enjoy the status symbol it provides in the knowledge that the CPS Solicitor HCA's will in all probability stay un wigged as their penny pinching employers are unlikely to stump up the cash for same.Let the un wigged be mistaken for ushers.

AGT1 may as an aside wish to know that after 500,000 miles of 911 tyre burning we do have one area where we are at one!

ps. Put your hand in you pocket - buy a wig. Discounts avalable !

Ged Hale- BailbusterS 

Posted: 03 January 2008 at 12:13 | IP Logged

Discounts? where?

Posted: 07 January 2008 at 10:53 | IP Logged

The concession that solicitor advocates can wear wigs is in my opinion hardly a point of principal, it seems to me rather pointless and petty tinkering with dress codes which are already hundreds of years out of date. Why bother?

More worryingly, for me, is saying "we" and "won". Who are we? For that matter, who are they, what distinguishes us from them and why are we fighting/competing with them. Interestingly, the wigs that "we" apparently fought hard to "win" are made from the hairs from the tails of horses. If what "we" are competing for is equality and recognition, shouldn't "we" be trying to raise our game to the standards set by the bar, rather than bickering over whether we get to dress lik a horse's a**e?

Oooooo, no more coffee for me...