· By Tam McDonald
Of all the reasons for locating the new Justice Quarter in Fleet Street, character comes out top.
An ambitious construction scheme for the Fleet Street area seemed to have survived its second phase of consultation and, as the new year turned, was on course to deliver a significant new block of buildings on the south side of Fleet Street between Whitefriars Street and Salisbury Court. A new “Justice Quarter” would create a suite of 18 new law courts with an intended focus upon financial crime, as well as providing a new police headquarters for the City of London.
Then came the spanner, in the shape of objections lodged by the national heritage body Historic England, who were reported in the media as variously “slamming” and “blasting” the plans for the £240 million-pound development. Their objection was that it would cause serious harm to “one of the most characterful parts of historic London”. Neither the scheme itself nor the objections to it have been widely reported: the alleged damage being anticipated is cited in The Architects Journal.
If by “character” we mean charming and evocative of tourist London in its aulde finery, then these objections are understandable, at least to a point. Between them, the Fire of London and the wartime air raids burned and bombed their way well beyond that point, and even the highest admirers of the Old Stones of Fleet Street would agree that the City of London has more characterful corners to show for its two millennia of history.
But there is another sense of the word character that applies more accurately to the City of London generally over those two thousand years and, in the more recent past – a mere 800 years – to Fleet Street in particular. The attribution of character to the behaviour of people who are resourceful, resolute, and resilient is higher praise than can be excited by a pile of masonry, however charming.
In this light it may be possible to see the proposed development around Salisbury Square as a more positive reflection of the accomplishments of the legal profession over those eight centuries. Not only were the Inns of Court instrumental in shaping the legal framework of so much of the English-speaking world, but the audience of readers among those many thousands of lawyers inspired the hundreds of printing presses that powered the Enlightenment and transformed the English language.
Today, in a post-Brexit, emergent post-Covid world, it is proposed that a new Justice Quarter be sited in the historical legal precincts of Fleet Street. This comes at a time when the country is looking anew at promoting its ideals and culture in a world that is itself contemplating significant and systemic changes. Just as Fleet Street recovered with unmatched vision and energy in the aftermath of the decade of plague and fire in the 1660s, so will the coming years require innovation and resilience in equal portion – and no half-measures.
If the City of London seeks to create a new Justice Quarter on a foundation of character, it has come to the right place in Salisbury Square.