Civil and Criminal Panel Counsel

Civil Panel Counsel

The Attorney General maintains four panels of Junior Counsel to undertake civil and European Community work for all government departments, plus a number of specialist Standing Counsel posts. There are three London Panels (A Panel for senior juniors, B Panel for middle juniors and C Panel for junior juniors) and a regional panel.

The size of each panel is determined by need. Although appointment to any of the Panels cannot be a guarantee that work will be available, it is intended that each advocate appointed should be given at least a minimum amount of work, and a monitoring process is in place for this purpose.

Further information on the Civil Panel Counsel can be found on the TSol website

Criminal Panel Counsel

In April 2001, the Attorney General established a single Unified List (UL) of prosecuting advocates to undertake criminal work for participating government departments throughout England and Wales. The key principles were to ensure that the quality of those advocates presenting cases on behalf of the government was high, that the recruitment process should be transparent and fair, that the list should be drawn from a wide and diverse range of people and that there should be a fair spread of work.

The Attorney General constituted a Management Board for the UL, drawn from the departments and agencies which used the list, to administer it on a day to day basis and deal with recruitment issues. The Board was chaired by Revenue and Customs Prosecution Office (RCPO) with members from Department For Business Innovation and Skills (BIS as it now is), Health and Safety Executive (HSE), Department for Rural Affairs (DEFRA), Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), Department of Health (DH), Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) and Environment Agency (EA).

With the merger of RCPO and CPS in January 2010, the Chair of the Management Board was taken over jointly by DWP/DH and BIS as the two largest users of advocates. Following that and other changes the Board has taken the opportunity to fully review the purpose, function and management of the Unified List.

Letter from the Chair of the Attorney General's Unified List - December 2011

Current selection exercise for Unified List - closing date Monday 12 March 2012 at noon

List of Specialist Regulatory Advocates in Health and Safety and Environmental Law and Appointment of Standing Counsel

On 31st March 2012 the Attorney General's Unified List of Prosecuting Advocates will come to an end. The Health and Safety Executive, Environment Agency and Office of Rail Regulation wish to appoint a list of advocates to conduct their higher court prosecution work and other regulatory advocacy. HSE and ORR also each wish to appoint two Standing Counsel.

By agreement the HSE will be undertaking the administration arrangements for the selection process on behalf of the members of the Regulatory List Board. However the selection process itself will be conducted jointly by all three bodies. It is intended that all future instruction of counsel in prosecution and ancillary matters by the HSE, EA and ORR will be by reference to the Regulatory List

Further details of the scheme, the selection criteria and how to make an application are available at http://www.hse.gov.uk/sellingtohse/contracts.htm

The closing date for applications is Monday 12th March 2012 at 12 noon.

In the event of this selection exercise not being completed by 31st March advocates will continue to be instructed from the Unified List until the Regulatory List is finalised.

If you have any queries in relation the scheme or the application process please contact Steven McCarthy by e-mail at Regulatory.List@hse.gsi.gov.uk or by telephone on 0151 951 5830

Appointment of Standing Counsel for the Department for Business Innovation and Science (BIS)

BIS wishes to appoint up to 6 Standing Counsel. Further details of the application process and selection criteria can be obtained by sending an e-mail to standingcounsel.recruitment@bis.gsi.gov.uk.

The closing date for applications is Wednesday 14th March 2012.

If you have any queries in relation the scheme or the application process please contact Judy Kennedy e-mail at standingcounsel.recruitment@bis.gsi.gov.uk. or by telephone on 0207 215 5767