The Most Important Thing of All

After the success of The Main Chance. Yorkshire Television created a second legal series.

Justice concentrates on a successful legal barrister Harriet Peterson (Margaret Lockwood.)

The first episode seems to sideline Harriet in favour of her conniving ex husband James Kirby (William Franklyn.) He is a struck off solicitor who has been jailed.

Kirby wants Harriet to ex cellmate Eddy Plater who is standing trial of a bank robbery. Kirby stands to be paid a lot of money from Plater if his ex wife represents him and he is acquitted.

The first problem is that Plater needs another firm of solicitors to represent him. Harriet will not deal with his existing firm because of unpaid bills.

The new solicitor Jardine is uneasy as to why Plater wants him. He does not specialise in crime and later is unsure of Kirby's motives.

Whereas The Main Chance had dynamism because the main character wanted to drive away the crusty dusty lawyers and the old boy's network.

Justice is staid and traditional. There is no reference that Harriet might be trailblazing female barrister. Women at the bar would had been a minority back in the early 1970s.

It is Kirby, the ex solicitor who displays the tricks of the trade. The way he schemes up a new judge to try Plater's case because the scheduled judge hates robbers.

The first episode seems to be more about Jardine complaining that he got Kirby as a client. If I was Kirby I would had gone to a proper criminal solicitor willing to put up a fight.