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Bewigged [or not!] - and being bemused

To those not accustomed to seeing judges and barristers sporting a wig and old-fashioned collars and bands, it is seen as an anachronism in the 21st century. It is! So, the decision to do away with wigs, collars and bands in civil cases in the UK should have been seen as a small step in the right direction in bring the legal system into the modern age.

But wait! The English Bar has rebelled and wants to retain the old-world regalia - as this somewhat bemusing piece in The Independent explains:

"The arch-reformers of the Bar must be pulling out their hair in despair. No sooner have the judges taken the bold step of agreeing to remove their wigs in court than barristers have voted to keep theirs on.

A survey of 15,000 advocates published this week has left the leaders of the Bar in no doubt as to what its membership thinks of wigless lawyers. Two-thirds of barristers and "interested parties" polled said that they wished to retain full legal costume in High Court cases and above.

This now raises the rather unedifying spectacle of a courtroom presided over by a bare-headed judge hearing arguments advanced by barristers looking even more like players in the royal courts of Hanoverian England.

In July, Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, the Lord Chief Justice, announced that from next year, judges in civil cases will no longer wear wigs, collars and bands. Instead they will sport a continental-style gown. For criminal cases the wig is to be retained."

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