... Moving Now To My 33rd Point...

[liadnan]

From RollOnFriday

Nicholas Stadlen QC has smashed the record for the longest speech in British legal history after his opening address in the BCCI case lasted an incredible 119 days....

Still, at least he didn't then ask for leave to amend.

Comments

[fi.livejournal.com]

i saw this mentioned in the BBC's 7 days quiz, and don't ask me why, but I immediately thought "bet liadnan will post about that..."

[liadnan]

This is because I am dull and predictable these days...

[fi.livejournal.com]

No, I think it's probably more that it sounded like something your sense of irony and humour would latch onto straight away. :-)

[liadnan]

Thankyou for that sop to my self-esteem...

[tefkas.livejournal.com]

That's remarkably verbose of him.

Unless.

He.

Spoke.

Very.

Slowly.

[liadnan]

To be fair, this is really complicated and heavyweight litigation, which has already spawned one of the longest judgments in the law reports. There are very serious amounts of money, and complex legal principles, at stake. And it isn't the longest in the world - my reference to "leave to amend" goes back a few years to Crystal's opening in the Thyssen litigation, where he was on his feet for six months and then asked for leave to amend (ie alter the basis of the case) before he had finished. That was in Bermuda though.

Still, it is somewhat excessive.

[blonde222.livejournal.com]

What kind of law do you do, please?

I don't know much about it (ie law) except that I used to work in Lincoln's Inn Fields and I vaguely knew that they did something called chancery in there.

Also that they had things called Dinners. And that there were always large film crew trailers parked outside. All very intriguing.

[liadnan]

I do stuff to do with land, stuff to do with private companies, stuff to do with the property of dead people, and stuff to do with trusts. And art, when it comes up, which is almost never.

Which is a large part of chancery law (that law which before 1875 fell within the jurisdiction of the Court of Chancery and now, if High Court business, gets assigned to the Chancery Division: I appreciate this is something of a circular definition).

Lincoln's Inn makes a reasonable amount of money by hiring itself out as a film set.

[liadnan]

Oh, and I do a bit of insolvency work. But it depresses me because it gives me The Fear (that one day I will be on the other side,.,.)

[blonde222.livejournal.com]

I still don't understand what Chancery is, but I will say that on the front page of the New York Times Arts section today there is a big hoo-ha about 32 new? fake? Pollocks conveniently just discovered in someone's attic. You never know.