DOZENS of lawyers are set to boycott specially arranged courts across the country during the Glasgow COP26 events.
Anticipating a large number of arrests, the Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service (SCTS) recently announced additional custody courts at Paisley, Hamilton and Falkirk Sheriff Courts on each Saturday during the conference period, in addition to the previously announced weekend custody courts in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen.
For a two-week period High Court trials will be dispersed to sheriff courts outwith Glasgow and the legal profession has complained of the additional workload all the changes will cause.
Now several Bar Associations have told SCTS and the Scottish Government they will opt out of a duty solicitor scheme during the international conference.
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Fiona McKinnon, president of the Glasgow Bar Association, has written to Justice Secretary Keith Brown, Legal Affairs Minister Ash Denham and Colin Lancaster, chief executive of the Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB), to confirm her association’s boycott of the scheme and weekend courts running in Glasgow.
She blamed the Scottish Government and Scottish Legal Aid Board for failing to detail the plan for non-COP26 cases that will call during the three weekend courts, adding: “Neither the Scottish Government representatives nor the relevant department at SLAB have responded and confirmed a proposal.”
McKinnon wrote: “Legal aid practitioners are under pressure as they have been at no time before in living memory. Pay disparity with our justice partners means we are unable to train and retain staff who are leaving us to better terms and conditions and sometimes double their salary in equivalent roles in the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and Scottish government departments.
“Your recent employment drives typify the disparity. Unless urgent action is taken, there will be a lack of gender equality, racial diversity and age diversity in the profession and the aging population of Criminal Defence Practitioners will not be replaced. Your own figures illustrate this. We are a declining population of practitioners.”
In a statement, Neil Martin, president of the Edinburgh Bar Association, said that “in light of the fundamental lack of capacity of our members to take on such anticipated volumes of work, our members have as an association voted not to engage with the proposed COP26 duty solicitor scheme”.
Aberdeen Bar Association is also understood to have opted out. The effects of such a mass country-wide boycott are unknown.
An SCTS spokesperson said: “As we published last week, COP26 contingency planning is under way for the management of court operations. The SCTS continues to actively review its planning and strategic response to the operational challenges posed by COP26 and key updates will continue to be provided as necessary.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “We have been engaging with the legal profession on an enhanced package of legal aid fees during the period of the COP26 conference and have responded positively to their proposals. We will continue to consider matters that they raise ahead of the conference.”
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