New Heads: Sumption and Hirst

NEW HEADS: SUMPTION AND HIRST

Christopher Clarke went on the bench in October 2005. He had been in the Bloody Sunday Inquiry for seven years, rather than the six months it was originally expected to take, and it was still far from concluded. He had had to spend a considerable part of those seven years in Northern Ireland. During that period he had neither been able to enjoy the range of other cases that his pre-eminent position at the bar would have enabled him to do, nor to go on the bench, which is what he wanted to do. Yet he never complained about his long sentence of confinement in the endless Saville Inquiry. But the problem he faced was that he was 58 by the time he was able to extricate himself to go on the bench, and the retirement age for judges had been lowered in 1994 from 75 to 70, leaving him less than twelve years on the bench. Had he been able to accept appointment six or seven years previously, as he had no doubt anticipated, he would surely have made it to the Supreme Court, and would have had a real shot at being appointed to one of the great legal offices, as had done Nick Phillips. Sadly, he simply ran out of time and his nevertheless distinguished judicial career never stretched beyond the Court of Appeal. Now he is back in chambers as an arbitrator and is President of the Court of Appeal in Bermuda.

Christopher had been an enormously popular Head of Chambers. Indeed, it was a reflection of the respect and affection in which he was held by members of chambers that, although in those seven years he spent long periods away from chambers in Northern Ireland, there was never any suggestion that he would be asked to stand down as head.

Jonathan Sumption was now pre-eminent both in chambers and at the bar. It was decided that, given the size of chambers, it was better henceforth to have the burden shared by two persons and Sumption and Jonathan Hirst were invited to act as co-heads.

It is hard to imagine two more different individuals than Sumption and Hirst. Sumption was a lawyer’s lawyer, whose towering presence came from his vast intellectual gifts. He had the air of a slightly eccentric professor. Hirst’s personal presence came from his booming voice and unforgettable laugh. One might on first meeting him think him almost a