I was told about an event that took place today involving a Prominent Silk, in a long running and tedious fraud case.
The previous day, the judge had asked for the legal argument to be presented to him in skeleton form, on no more than three sheets of A4. That evening, the Prominent Silk set to work on his submission and by the time he had finished, he had covered 23 sheets of A4.
Mindful of His Honour’s injunction, he shrunk the typeface until it covered a mere three sheets of paper.
In court today, the Eminent Silk handed in his homework. Before the judge had an opportunity to respond, the Eminent Silk handed up a single sheet, black with a miniscule typeface, and advised the judge that he had taken the precaution of fitting his submission on one sheet of A4, lest the version of medium length prove too long.
The judge asked whether the one page submission was materially different from the 23 page original.
