After the vocational stage the entrant is called to the Bar but cannot take his own clients until he has completed at least six months of a twelve month pupillage. When on pupilage it is a contractual relationship and not a contract of employment so they are not entitled to be paid the national minimum wage but the Bar Council has decided that as from 2003, most pupillages will receive a minimum funding of £10,000. After fifteen to twenty years experience, a junior barrister may seek appointment as a Queens Council. (QC).
The rule that a QC should never appear without a junior barrister (who is paid two thirds of the QC's fee) has been abandoned. QC's can and do appear alone in appropriate cases, and where a junior barrister is briefed, he is no longer entitled to anything other than a proper fee for his work.
Advocacy is the main function of a barristers work and much of their time will be spent in court or preparing for it. The role of a barrister also includes the drafting of legal documents and providing written opinions on legal problems hired by solicitor for client. .
Until the changes made under the Courts and Legal Services Act in 1990, barristers were, with few exceptions the only people allowed to advocate in the Superior Courts, House of Lords, and Courts of Appeal, the High Court and the Crown Courts, and Employment Appeal Tribunals. This has now changed and barristers are now finding themselves having to compete with solicitors for this type of work.
Barrister's work on a "Cab Rank- rule, but since 1996, they maybe hired by members of the public whose case have been prepared by a suitably trained person or institute such as the Citizen's Advice Bureaux (CAB), but from 2003, The Bar Council are proposing that barristers be allowed direct access to clients without needing to go through a solicitor. Since 1987, barristers were allowed to be hired by certain professionals, accountants, and engineers.
