This article, written by Michelle Celik, outlines some of the working practices for an information professional in a barristers' chambers, highlighting how the culture differs to that of law firms. Michelle describes how the role has evolved since she began working in a set of chambers and the impact that Covid-19 has played on information provision in recent years. She discusses the importance of external libraries to the needs of barristers and her own relationship with the staff within chambers.

This article has been written by Harpreet K. Dhillon, with contributions from colleagues at Gray's Inn Library, Inner Temple Library, Middle Temple Library and Lincoln's Inn's Library. During the course of the article, Harpreet looks at the way the four of Inns of Court libraries support barristers, though will use the term members interchangeably throughout. The Inns have their own histories, and the libraries function in their own unique ways, so the focus of this article are those key services provided by all the libraries and their relevance to the continuing work of Inn members. The article has been written using anecdotal evidence and contributions from all the library teams, concluding that the Inn libraries play a crucial and ongoing role in supporting the work of barristers, a role that evolves and will continue to do so alongside the legal profession's demands.

This article by Niamh Burns, Senior Manager for Library & Member Support Services at the Bar of Northern Ireland, provides a brief overview of the history of the Bar of Northern Ireland and an explanation of the Bar Library model and the services it provides. She provides an insight into some of the current issues facing the barrister profession in Northern Ireland, then focuses on what the Bar of Northern Ireland's Library & Information Service is doing to support members of the Bar Library in meeting some of their challenges.

This article by Nuala Byrne describes how the Library and Information Service of The Bar of Ireland, The Law Library, developed to support the profession of barrister from 2004 to the present day. It highlights key priorities addressed in the earlier years and how the service has developed since to deliver a modern, networked, knowledge-based library and information service, to barristers who are members of The Bar of Ireland.

Twenty years ago the author, Alison Million, submitted an article to Legal Information Management (LIM) entitled ‘Of Barristers and Books’ which recounted her experiences of working as a librarian to barristers’ chambers in the era of print and CDs. The article brought her into contact with the Librarian of Inner Temple Library and together they founded the Bar Librarians’ Group to meet the interests of both Inn and Chambers Librarians. This article in 2022 recounts how the ensuing 20 years have brought very different challenges to Chambers Librarians in the online era and how the Bar Librarians’ Group works hard to resolve difficulties on behalf of LIS professionals serving the Bar.

This article, written by Mark Hatcher, provides an overview of the background and achievements of the Bar Council, the professional body for barristers in England and Wales, since its formation in 1894. It traces the early years of the council and its expansion after the second world war, following the growth in legal aid and other post-war reconstruction measures. It describes changes in the structure and organisation of the Bar Council culminating in the implementation of reforms which followed the Legal Services Act 2007, which resulted in the separation of representation of the Bar from regulation of the profession which was delegated to the Bar Standards Board in 2006. It concludes with an overview of the key issues that are driving the Bar Council's activity to promote the Bar's high quality specialist advocacy and advisory services, and to promote access to justice for all.

The aim of this qualitative study is to explore new barristers’ information literacy (IL) experiences during their transition from education to the workplace. New barristers are defined as individuals currently doing pupillage or who qualified as professionals in the last two years. Although the transition into work constitutes an important period in new barristers’ legal careers during which they face many IL challenges, so far neither new barristers’ perspectives on their IL experiences nor their transition experiences have been examined in detail. The study employed semi-structured interviews to explore the IL experiences of six new barristers.* This thesis finds that new barristers face a variety of IL challenges and thus have different transition experiences. For them, legal research has emotional implications. As professionals, they have IL needs and experiences that are dissimilar from the ones they developed during their education. This impacts on the content and delivery of IL training for new barristers. The study broadens our understanding of legal IL and new legal professionals’ IL needs. It has implications for law librarians and legal educators as it throws the complexity of new barristers’ workplace IL into relief. Finally, the study offers some recommendations for IL training.

Barristers need information. They need it to defend their clients by presenting their case in court. Some of the information they need is to be found in a book; some is to be found on a database. Choices made by the barristers and the rationale for these choices form the basis for what is to follow, as Ruth Fay explains. In this piece of research, a lack of a control group meant that no firm conclusions could be drawn. However, some interesting findings emerged in terms of how the library was used. A number of recommendations were proposed. For the most part, they centred on practical and immediate rethinks with encouragement towards the ushering in of a new culture.

The lecturer discusses the subject of professional integrity, and considers the themes of: the particular space within which the professional operates; the independence and integrity of the professional, including regulation and competition; and how integrity is measured. The two professions on which he concentrates are the actuarial profession and the legal profession, particularly barristers.

This article from the Chair of the Bar Standards Board, Baroness Ruth Deech, considers the impact of the Legal Services Act 2007 on the regulation of the Bar.

At the BIALL Conference in June 2010 John Duffy presented a paper recounting his experiences of installing a bespoke desktop library interface for all the barristers, with customisation available and utilising Web 2.0 tools.

Guy Holborn, Librarian of Lincoln's Inn, considers whether the Inns of Court libraries have a future in the digital age. He discusses their longevity and their context within the profession. Unfortunately, the past gives several examples of such libraries which have not survived, but he is confident that history will not repeat itself.