Having gone to the trouble of organising a day conference on ‘The Psychiatrist in Court’, primarily directed at trainees, we were disappointed to find that on the day the considerable audience was composed mostly of consultants. This seemed a pity, particularly as we knew that this was an area of concern to many young psychiatrists. Kindly colleagues assured us that it is always difficult to get juniors to attend conferences. Nonetheless we were curious to know why trainees seemed more reluctant to take time away from their normal duties than perhaps their ‘more pressed’ consultants.