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Why you can trust SCMP
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THE NOON DAY gun, tea at the Peninsula, Government House, the Jackson Room at the Hong Kong Club: they are still there, vestiges of a colonial past.

Likewise our barristers continue to don horsehair wigs and dark robes, immune to passing centuries and changing sovereignty. Judges are still addressed as M'Lord and fellow advocates 'my learned friend'.

The barristers have also kept a firm grip on exclusive powers to conduct a High Court trial.

Hong Kong is the last significant jurisdiction to arm barristers with these rights. It is all undoubtedly steeped in rich and colourful history, but has this become a colonial anachronism?

The remaining 85 per cent of the legal profession who are barred from conducting a High Court trial have responded with an emphatic yes.

Last week the Law Society released its latest salvo - a report outlining support of the vast majority of solicitors in Hong Kong.

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