Paid prosecutors sought for disciplinary tribunals panel

The Bar Standards Board (BSB) has announced plans to form a new tribunal representation panel (TRP).

The panel will represent the BSB at the Bar's independent disciplinary tribunals and at a range of other hearings associated with its enforcement processes.

It is seeking applications from chambers or other authorised organisations specialising in regulatory and disciplinary law to join the panel which will start operating from 1 January 2020.

The move will see lawyers paid for their services for the first time – currently representation is provided free of charge by around 60 individual barristers who volunteer on a pro bono basis and are of at least seven years’ call.

The BSB is looking for would-be prosecutors with a strong and demonstrable track record of representing regulators in disciplinary cases, who can offer counsel across a range of seniorities and also be able to demonstrate experience in public law as it relates to professional disciplinary processes.

Pay will be divided into three bands according to post-qualification experience, the BSB’s application pack states: those with two to five years’ experience will be paid a brief fee of £1,000 and refresher fee of £500 per day after the first day of the final hearing.

Barristers with five to 10 years’ experience will receive a brief fee of £1,750 and refresher fees of £750 per day; and barristers with more than 10 years of experience will receive a brief fee of £2,000 and refresher fees of £1,000 per day.

BSB director of legal and enforcement Sara Jagger (pictured) said: "The establishment of a new panel to provide us with ready access to paid legal representation at disciplinary tribunals and other enforcement hearings is an important development in our aim to conduct our legal and enforcement work as professionally and efficiently as possible. I look forward to hearing from those interested in working with us."

Recent BSB statistics show that there has been an average of 38 hearings per year in the last couple of years at an average length of 1.3 days per case. However, the number of tribunal cases is rising as are their complexity and it is anticipated that the number of hearings in 2020/21 will be greater and could exceed 45.