The General Council of the Bar, commonly known as the Bar Council, is the representative body for barristers in England and Wales. Established in 1894, the Bar Council is the "approved regulator" of barristers, but delegates its regulatory function to the independent Bar Standards Board. As the lead representative body for barristers in England and Wales, the Bar Council’s work is devoted to ensuring the Bar’s voice is heard, efficiently and effectively, and with the interests of the Bar (and the public interest) as its focus.
History The General Council of the Bar was created in 1894 to deal with breaches of a barrister's professional standards, something that had previously been handled by the judiciary. Along with the Inns of Court it formed the Senate of the Inns of Court and the Bar in 1974, a union that was broken up on 1 January 1987 following a report by Lord Rawlinson. The Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 designated the Bar Council as the professional body for barristers, with the role as a regulatory body being split off in 2006 to form the Bar Standards Board.
Committees
As part of the representative remit of the Bar Council, it has a number of representative committees. The most senior of these is the Bar Council, which has 56 members representing organisations such as the Circuits and Specialist Bar Associations, and 60 members elected by the wider Bar.
There are a further fourteen committees, including:
Bar Representation Committee Education and Training Committee Employed Barristers Committee Equality, Diversity, and Social Mobility Committee Ethics Committee European Committee General Management Committee International Committee Law Reform Committee Legal Services Committee Pro Bono and Social Responsibility Committee Remuneration Committee
List of chairs
1891–1899: Herbert Cozens-Hardy 1899–1901: Joseph Walton 1901–1907: Marshall Warmington 1907–c. 1913: William English Harrison 1913–18: Paul Ogden Lawrence 1918–20: John Alderson Foote 1920–31: Sir Thomas Hughes 1931–32: E. A. Mitchell-Innes 1932–46: Sir Herbert Cunliffe 1946–1947: Sir Charles Doughty 1947–48: G. O. Slade 1948–52: Sir Godfrey Russell Vick 1952–57: Hartley Shawcross 1957–58: Milner Holland 1958–60: Gerald Gardiner 1960–62: Geoffrey Lawrence 1962–63: Sir Milner Holland 1963–66: Joseph Molony 1966–68: The Hon H. A. P. Fisher 1968–70: Desmond Ackner 1970–72: John Arnold 1973–74: James Comyn 1974–75: Patrick Neill 1975–76: Sir Peter Rawlinson 1985–86: Robert Alexander 1987: Peter Scott 1988: Robert Johnson 1989: Desmond Fennell 1990: Peter Cresswell 1991: Anthony Scrivener 1992: The Lord Williams of Mostyn 1993: John Rowe 1994: Robert Seabrook 1995: Peter Goldsmith 1996: David Penry-Davey 1997: Robert Owen 1998: Heather Hallett 1999: Daniel Brennan 2000: Jonathan Hirst 2001: Roy Amlot 2002: David Bean 2003: Matthias Kelly 2004: Stephen Irwin 2005: Guy Mansfield 2006: Stephen Hockman 2007: Geoffrey Vos 2008: Timothy Dutton 2009: Desmond Browne 2010: Nicholas Green 2011: Peter Lodder 2012: Michael Todd 2013: Maura McGowan 2014: Nicholas Lavender 2015: Alistair MacDonald 2016: Chantal-Aimée Doerries 2017: Andrew Langdon 2018: Andrew Walker (commercial lawyer) 2019: Richard Atkins 2020: Amanda Pinto 2021: Derek Sweeting 2022: Mark Fenhalls 2023: Nick Vineall 2024: Sam Townend 2025: Barbara Mills 2026: Kirsty Brimelow
References
External links