April fools

A cold March that cannot make its mind up about being spring is fairly dire, but April is the cruellest month. It has to be really, what with its curious habits of breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire and stirring dull roots with spring rain.

He was very poetic, that T S Eliot, and also bang on the button about the fourth month of the year even if he did not have the cessation of the first six in mind. It can be a very cruel month indeed '“ when pupil barristers emerge, blinking into the light, from the dark basements where they have sweated over particulars of claim and puzzled over law reports with the comforting knowledge that their work, if good, will be praised and if less than good will be massaged into a better shape by kindly supervisors.

And now, they are, lilacs notwithstanding, on their own in front of tribunals that may not be kind at all. Neither massage nor support are theirs '“ hopefully they will have friendly numbers to call when panic strikes, and more pertinently the horny rhinocerous skin all advocates need. Forget Oil of Olay and Dove moisturiser for men '“ the skin care needed is the method used by First World War soldiers: pee in your boots to soften the leather and harden the skin, so that you can at least limp home.

Coming unprepared

The training pupils get in their first six is exponentially better now than it was. No longer a matter of purchasing a bad suit, mimicking the supervisors' mannerisms and picking up tips at chambers' teas, but advocacy training through the Inns and in chambers, assessed tests, compulsory lectures and seminars, court visits with junior tenants. But even so there is nothing to prepare them for the sheer horror of a DJ in a bad mood, and a client in the cells who knows '“ exactly and precisely '“ that you have never been that close to a wicket gate before. The question: 'Done a lot of these cases before love?' slurred out through a mocking grin, from a customer who was well up on criminal procedure before the lawyer sent to represent him was born, takes a certain art to answer.

They cannot, of course, lie. They must learn to divert. Ideally, they must also learn the skill of selective deafness. They should not hear remarks about their looks, if comely, of either gender, or requests for just one ciggie, and how no one will notice if you slide it through the wicket gate. They must never, ever hear or respond to questions about how old they are. The answer is guaranteed to end in tears. And they must try to avoid the elemental mistakes which begin as small personal tragedies, and end as ripe myth: the tyro advocate appearing in the old Clerkenwell magistrates, who climbed into the dock thinking it was the lawyers' row; the young solicitor walking into Bow Street to be greeted by a friend shouting across the marbled hall: 'Goodness this must be your FIRST CASE!' (And I have, repeatedly, apologised for that but know that forgiveness will never come.) Or, bone crushingly horribly, the new barrister who appeared before a fearsome and legendary female Stipendiary magistrate on a Saturday. Assuming she was a solitary lay justice he lectured her upon her limited sentencing powers...

After the first case, it gets better, surely? Think again. There is greater torture in store. There is the first summary youth court trial. Given a few days to prepare, the diligent young advocate prepares it. And prepares it. And re-prepares it. Eventually, everyone he or she knows can recite the whole thing off by heart. Mothers in far-off shires can quote the law on attempted theft in their sleep '“ every even faintly obliging member of chambers is heartily sick of the fell words: 'Can I just run something past you?'

The great day dawns, up at six just to check a point or two, into the carefully pressed court suit, off to court. And the worst possible thing happens '“ the case does not go ahead.

Growing confidence

Eventually it does get easier, the cases come in, get done competently, small victories accrue like petals at their feet and confidence grows. But fresh pain awaits. One day, the clerks or your solicitor will tell you that the new case might be a bit of fun, but is completely unwinnable. You will read it. You will pinch yourself, and read it again. And then you will see that far from being unwinnable, only a moron would lose it. Not only have the police broken every rule in the book, but the prosecution evidence is a mess, and items in the news prove your client did indeed have an alibi... oh my god he is clearly innocent. And the responsibility is all yours. Only you stand between your client and a miscarriage of justice '“ only you and your applications to exclude dodgy evidence, exclude hearsay, exclude a duff character application, and after that lot cross examine a police officer who has to, just has to, leave the witness box in tears, begging forgiveness.

Win that, and it will all have been worthwhile. Until the first Crown Court trial. And the hideous decision has to be made '“ does one tell the usher it is the 'first trial', so that the news filters into the judge? Is this good '“ a gentle judge might cut you a little slack '“ or bad '“ an old brute will lick judicial lips, sharpen his claws and have at you with undisguised relish?

The new lot have all of this to look forward to or to dread, depending on their habit. And experienced criminal advocates will, according to their habit, be kind or dismissive towards them. It is better to be kind, on the whole '“ and never, ever, tell them that, like childbirth, the first appearance in the Court of Appeal is worse than anything they could ever have imagined.