A LEADING QC has cashed in on his rival’s absence to earn an expected record of £3 million in fees this year.

Lord Grabiner, who is already one of the most sought-after QCs at the Bar, has found the field clear to charge as much as £3,000 an hour, according to senior solicitors who instruct him regularly. This is a huge hike on his standard £1,000 per hour rate.

The reason is that his main rival, Gordon Pollock, QC, has commanded his own £3 million brief fee, representing BCCI’s liquidators against the Bank of England. This has left tied him up until at least 2005.

The disclosure of the new “fat cat” fee levels comes in today’s issue of The Lawyer magazine. A senior litigator at one of the top ten City law firms said: “I now tell my clients that Grabiner costs £3,000 an hour. That’s usually what it works out at.”

One senior lawyer told The Lawyer that he recently paid Lord Grabiner £10,000 for a one-hour meeting. Another told of paying Lord Grabiner £60,000 for a day’s trial.

A small number of silks are expected to earn £2 million this year, laying to rest the idea that the best QCs inhabit a “£1 million a year club”.

Lord Grabiner’s partner in chambers, Elizabeth Gloster, QC, is set to rake in £2 million, as is the insolvency barrister, Michael Crystal, QC, and David Goldberg, QC, who is believed to be the highest-paid member of the tax Bar.

The news comes as hundreds of barristers who do publicly funded work are threatening to strike over new government pay levels for murder and fraud cases.

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