Behind bars | The not so distant future

Scene: a London Crown Court. Date: the day after it has been privatised, and sold to GreedisgoodHedge Fund (registered office - the Cayman islands).

Time: 9.05 am.

Monday morning. It's raining. A barrister enters the security area of the court. She looks somewhat tired, and a little disconsolate. She puts her bag and umbrella onto the security carousel, and heaves her very large and obviously heavy wheelie carrier onto the conveyor belt.

Three young security guards watch her with dull eyes. They do not help her.

Security Guard 1: "That looks '¨heavy miss."

Barrister, (panting): "It is a little, yes."

Security guard 1: "You're overweight miss."

Barrister: "I beg your pardon?"

Security Guard 1: "Overweight. See my colleague at the end please. Next!"

Barrister: "Pardon?"

Security guard 2: "Yes, overweight. That will be £17.25 please. Cash or card?"

Barrister: "I'm sorry, I don't quite understand..."

Security guard 2 (very slowly, as to an idiot): " Your case is over weight. You have exceeded your baggage weight limit. Have you got £17.25?"

Barrister: "And if I don't pay?"

Security guard 2: "Then you don't get your papers for your case. Miss."

Barrister, having emptied her pockets and produced £17.50 in assorted scruffy notes and coins: "Remind me please, what is the code for the robing room?"

Security guard 2: "It's 3415. That'll be £2. Cash or card?"

Barrister: "Excuse me?"

Security guard 2: "Entry to the robing room is a facility provided by Greedisgood PLC, the owners of this building. Cash '¨or card?"

Barrister (weakly): "And if I don't pay?"

Security guard 2: "Then you don't get entry to the robing room and all its numerous professional facilities. Like the computer you have to check into before you get paid."

The barrister scrabbles around and finds some change in the bottom of her handbag, and hands it over. Fearing that she cannot afford the lift, she lugs her bag to the first floor where she finds a till outside the robing room. She strides forward confidently, and is about to tap in the code to the security lock when...

Security Log Guard: "Cash or card?"

Barrister, confidently: "It's ok - I paid downstairs."

The guard isn't listening, and why should she? She is paid the minimum wage and given ten minutes on-the-job training. "It's £8 one visit, or we have a BOGOF - £11 for two, as long as you redeem the voucher within 1 hour. Cash or card?"

The barrister is beginning to lose her temper. "I already paid damn you! I paid £2 downstairs!"

Guard: "Entry to the facility is £8. £2 pays for the information about the code. Cash '¨or card?"

Barrister: "Are you telling me that I '¨now have to pay to get into my own '¨robing room?"

Guard: "Oh - your own robing room? I am sorry Miss, but are you a shareholder or an investor?"

Barrister: "I have invested my entire professional life in the decent maintenance of a criminal justice system. I am a barrister of 20-years' standing. I have survived more cuts than a butcher's dog. I am a veteran of 27 criminal justice acts, each more stupid than the last. I still turn out every day for the deprived, the ill, the disadvantaged, the foolish, the young, the vulnerable defendants a third of whom are in fact innocent and the rest of whom are not as evil as The Daily Mail would have us believe. I do this for less money than I earned eight years ago. I have not had a pay rise since time immemorial. I am accused of being a fat cat by people who award themselves hefty pay rises annually. I cannot go out to dinner without people asking me how I can defend someone when I know they are guilty. And I still believe in justice, the independent bar, and the common law. Yes, this is my f***ing robing room."

SLG: "Any more language like that and I will call security. Cash or card?"

Barrister, weakly: "Card."

And if you laughed at any of this, dear reader, then please go online and sign any petition you can find that fights the destruction of our criminal justice system, the destruction of legal aid, the destruction of our vital civil rights. When they are gone, they are gone.