STUDENT
www.legalweek.com
AUTUMN 2009
THEJOBSQUEEZE
CHANGING MARKET MEANS FEWER TRAINING CONTRACTS
PLUS: MAGIC CIRCLE INSIDER – WHY I LEFT THE CITY • ‘DON’T GO
TO THE CRIMINAL BAR’ – A DISILLUSIONED BARRISTER LETS RIP
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CONTENTS
2 News
EDITORIAL
Editor: Alex Novarese (9847)
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The latest student and
junior lawyer news
18
6 The job squeeze
How hard is getting a
training contract in the
current market?
10 Career Clinic
Advice from posters on
legalweek.com
12 Step by step:
becoming
a solicitor
Legal Week’s guide to
qualifying as a solicitor
14 All tied up
A look at the exclusive
GDL and LPC deals
dominating legal
training
18 Stay on
your toes
Deferred trainees
should be doing
something constructive
with their year off,
writes Monika Ghose
20 Moving on up
What are law firms
doing to improve social
mobility?
24 Learning law
in prison
John Hirst outlines his
unconventional legal
education
26 Vac scheme
perks
The bait law firms are
using to hook students
28 Charm offensive
26
Making the most of
your vac scheme…
and the accompanying
free drinks
30Great escape
One young solicitor’s
account of why City
law wasn’t for him
31 Dreaming of law
An ex-advertiser on
why she gave it all up
for a career in law
32City survival
Insider info on dodging
the bullets
34GDL top tips
What you’ve got to
do to come through
the conversion
course unscathed
Bar special
40 Crime doesn’t
pay
‘Don’t go to the
criminal
Bar’ says a
disillusioned
barrister. But leading
Silk Simon Myerson
QC disagrees
46 News
The latest news
from the junior Bar
40
50 Money talks
Going behind
the lines of the
pupillage salary
war at the
commercial Bar
54 Step by step:
becoming a
barrister
Legal Week’s guide
to qualifying
as a barrister
56 Bar Career
Clinic
Advice from posters
on legalweek.com
58 Take a
chance
Chancery is more
than just Dickensian
disputes over wills
60 Law, novels
and waves
Tim Kevan explains
how he wrote
acclaimed novel
‘BabyBarista and
the Art of War’
www.legalweek.com/students
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009 1
NEWS
[email protected]
Barclays Capital’s (BarCap) firstever legal graduate trainees have
successfully completed their training
contracts, with all five being retained
by the investment bank.
The trainees undertook four
six-month rotations among teams
within BarCap’s London finance and
business departments.
Although they benefited from
some training from BarCap’s panel
of regular legal advisers - which
includes several magic circle outfits
- they did not undertake any private
practice seats.
BarCap legal department director
Francis Dickinson commented:
“Legal training within an investment
bank offers unparalleled experience
and access to the business. It has
required a major input in terms
of time and effort in order for us
to match the quality of training
students receive in private practice.”
He added that the scheme has
had “a strong take-up” since it
began two years ago, with law
graduates with previous experience
in accounting and insurance among
those winning places.
Another six trainees are set to
qualify from the programme in 2010,
although this year’s intake has been
reduced from five to four trainees
in London. However, two graduates
have recently started the programme
in Singapore for the first time,
bringing the total number of BarCap
trainees up to six.
BarCap refused to comment on the
PA Photos
BARCAP RETAINS 100% OF
TRAINEES AFTER IN-HOUSE TCS
‘LEGAL TRAINING WITHIN
AN INVESTMENT BANK
OFFERS UNPARALLELED
EXPERIENCE AND ACCESS
TO THE BUSINESS’
Francis Dickinson, BarCap
remuneration received by its trainees
or whether they sponsored them
through the Graduate Diploma in Law
(GDL) and Legal Practice Course (LPC).
Most leading law firms pay all GDL
and LPC fees, alongside providing
maintenance grants of up to £7,000
for each year, while trainee salaries
at such firms range from £35,000 to
£40,000 per year.
COLLEGE OF LAW TOPS THE CLASS TO SEAL ASHURST TRAINING TIE-UP
[email protected]
Ashurst has become one of the last
law firms in the UK top 20 to sign an
exclusive deal to send all its future
trainees to a specific course provider.
From 2010, all Ashurst trainees
will study at the College of Law, with
the law school beating competition
from rivals including BPP, Kaplan
Law School and the Oxford Institute
of Legal Practice to secure the
agreement.
The deal will see up to 60 Ashurst
trainees each year studying the Legal
Practice Course (LPC) at the College of
Law’s Moorgate branch, with around
25 students taking the Graduate
Diploma in Law at any of the College’s
eight centres nationwide.
The contract, which runs until
2013 with an option to renew for
two further years, will see the trainees
study core areas alongside students
‘THE DECISION
BETWEEN
PROVIDERS WAS
A QUESTION OF
MILLIMETRES
RATHER THAN
CLEAR BLUE
WATER, WITH A
FEELING THAT THE
COLLEGE OF LAW
REPRESENTED THE
BEST FIT FOR US’
David Carter, Ashurst
from other firms, with electives taught
in firm-specific groups using Ashurst
case studies and precedents.
DLA Piper, Eversheds and Clyde
& Co are the only UK top 20 firms
without an exclusive arrangement
with a particular training provider.
Commenting on the arrangement,
Ashurst graduate recruitment partner
David Carter told Legal Week: “We
felt there was no benefit from having
students at separate institutions.
And having arrived at that point, the
decision between providers was a
question of millimetres rather than
clear blue water, with a feeling that
the College of Law represented the
best fit for us.”
The news coincides with the
announcement of two further
exclusive training agreements by
the College of Law. LPC deals with
London’s Harbottle & Lewis and
Guildford-based Stevens & Bolton
take its tally of firms up to 18,
equalling BPP’s total. Last month, the
London office of Dechert became the
latest firm to sign up with BPP.
MAYER BROWN DEFERS HALF OF NQ INTAKE UNTIL NEW YEAR
[email protected]
Mayer Brown has put back the start
dates of half of its trainee intake, with
seven newly-qualified (NQ) solicitors
asked to defer until January.
The international firm offered 14
of 21 trainees positions within the
firm, but has asked half to defer their
start dates until the New Year with no
financial compensation.
2 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
The new associates were notified
of the decision during the summer by
the firm’s HR department when they
were informed that only half would
begin work this month.
The decision came after a review
of Mayer Brown’s City office was
launched in March, with senior
management freezing staff and
associate salaries and reducing
headcount.
The firm cut 55 jobs in its London
arm, including 23 associates and 32
support staff, while training contract
start dates were put back until 2010.
A firm spokesperson said: “In July,
when we offered jobs to those due
to qualify in September, we asked
seven of those to start with us in
January 2010. It has been a difficult
decision, but we wanted to be able
to offer positions to as many people
as possible.”
The news comes a week after City
firm CMS Cameron McKenna asked
seven newly-qualified trainees to
defer their start dates by up to three
months.
The newly-qualified lawyers have
agreed to defer their start dates at the
firm from the usual date of 1 September
to dates ranging from 1 October to 1
December later in the year.
www.legalweek.com/students
CITY TRIO CUT GRANT FOR STUDENTS ON NEW STREAMLINED LPC
[email protected]
Three of the five firms in the
City Legal Practice Course (LPC)
consortium have reduced their 200910 maintenance grants in the wake
of the launch of BPP Law School’s
new fast-track course.
The streamlined LPC, which was
approved by the Solicitors Regulatory
Authority in January and launched
last month, runs over just sevenand-a-half months rather than the
previous length of 10.
Future trainees at consortium firms
Lovells, Slaughter and May, Freshfields
Bruckhaus Deringer, Norton Rose and
Herbert Smith all study the LPC at
BPP, and the move to cut the duration
of the course has prompted three of
the firms to revise their maintenance
grants.
Lovells has opted to reduce its
grant from £8,000 to £7,000, while
Freshfields has cut its grant from
£7,250 to £6,000, and Slaughters
has reduced its grant from £7,450 to
£5,580.
However, Herbert Smith and
Norton Rose have opted to keep their
grants at last year’s level of £7,000.
The new course aims to increase
the amount of face-to-face training
that students receive. The 200910 intake is split into two, with
half starting in August and the rest
in February. It will then be up to
individual consortium members to
decide when the students join their
firm after completing the course.
SIMMONS MULLS PSYCHOMETRIC TESTING TO BOOST TRAINEE DIVERSITY
[email protected]
Simmons & Simmons is considering
introducing psychometric testing into
its graduate recruitment process in a
bid to increase diversity.
The firm hopes testing will improve
the quality of candidates accepted for
training contracts and at the same
time promote diverse representation
by being less reliant on academic
qualifications such as A-levels.
Simmons has been working with
an external recruitment consultancy
since earlier this summer and has
been advised on a number of different
testing options.
Simmons graduate recruitment
partner Nick Benwell said: “There are
not any tests that are specifically aimed
at the legal profession so we need to
be sure that they are relevant.
“The principal goal is to make sure
we get the best candidates. I am not
in favour of having tests for testing’s
sake, or just to get the number of
applicants down. The overriding aim is
to ensure that we pick those with the
greatest potential.”
Simmons’ plans make it the latest
in a string of firms looking to adapt
recruitment methods. Norton Rose
has been testing new measures
while Herbert Smith piloted a verbal
reasoning test this year for around
1,000 students applying for its spring
and summer vacation schemes. The
firm is still reviewing whether it will be
implementing the system across next
season’s vacation scheme and training
contract selection process. Freshfields
Bruckhaus Deringer, meanwhile, piloted
an online verbal reasoning test this year.
Firms including Lovells, CMS
Cameron McKenna, Linklaters and
Clifford Chance already use some
aspects of psychometric testing and
verbal reasoning as part of their preselection or interview processes.
In a separate development, Herbert
‘THE PRINCIPAL
GOAL IS TO
MAKE SURE WE
GET THE BEST
CANDIDATES. I AM
NOT IN FAVOUR
OF HAVING TESTS
FOR TESTING’S
SAKE’
Nick Benwell, Simmons &
Simmons
Smith has also stepped up its attempts
to recruit more diversely by teaming
up with ethnic minority and sexual
orientation groups at universities, as
well as working with disability charity
EmployAbility. In addition, from
October, applicants to Herbert Smith
will state on their application forms
whether they attended state-funded or
private education establishments.
market environment.”
Slaughter and May has the highest
retention rate among leading City firms
– 94% – after holding onto 47 of its
50 qualifiers.
Ashurst’s retention rate stands at
73%, while Norton Rose is keeping
on 83%. However, Taylor Wessing and
Denton Wilde Sapte have retained
just 54%.
LOVELLS TO KEEP ON 69% OF
SEPTEMBER QUALIFYING INTAKE
[email protected]
Lovells has retained 69% of its
September qualifiers, placing the firm
broadly in line with its City rivals.
Thirty-six trainees from a qualifying
intake of 40 applied for a job at the
firm, with a total of 25 taken on.
This retention rate marks a slight
decrease on Lovells’ trainee intakes in
March – when the firm retained 78%
– and September 2008, when 74%
were kept on
The firm said it is offering
www.legalweek.com/students
outplacement counselling and seeking
temporary roles for those who did not
make the cut.
A Lovells spokesperson: “We
recognise some will be disappointed
they have not been taken on and we
are looking for temporary roles for
them with the firm and elsewhere, with
one trainee already recruited to stay on
a contract basis as a temporary lawyer.
“This is the first time in many years
that the number of roles has been less
than the number of qualifying trainees
and it is a reflection of the uncertain
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009 3
NEWS
FRESHFIELDS APPOINTS NEW TRAINEE RECRUITMENT CHIEF
[email protected]
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
has named finance partner Simon
Johnson as the firm’s new trainee
recruitment partner, replacing UK
corporate chief Mark Rawlinson.
Rawlinson, who took up
the role in February 2008, has
brought in 14 new partners to
Freshfields’ interview panel, with
each dedicating about 100 hours
a year to interviewing candidates
and establishing stronger links
with universities. At the time of his
appointment he said he would spend
Johnson: overseeing traineeships
about 500 hours per year on the job.
In April 2008 Rawlinson took over
as City corporate chief, succeeding
Tim Jones, who was appointed
London head at the end of 2007.
Johnson said: “During any period
of economic downturn, having
top-notch lawyers who deliver
excellent client service is a source
of immense competitive advantage,
and recruiting new talent is therefore
more important than ever.”
In addition, the role of head of
UK trainee recruitment and head
of diversity and inclusion is to be
split in two, with current incumbent
Deborah Dalgliesh taking up a fulltime post as head of diversity and
inclusion. The new head of the UK
trainee recruitment position will
be taken up by trainee recruitment
manager Elizabeth Cope.
All three roles commenced on 1
October. Global human resources
director Kevin Hogarth said: “These
three moves reflect Freshfields’
commitment to attracting and
retaining the brightest and most
talented individuals. The role of
trainee recruitment partner is an
important one and we thank Mark
for the dedication he has shown.”
WRAGGES SHIFTS VAC SCHEME WHILE COL CALLS TO SCRAP TCS
By Legal Week staff
Wragge & Co has moved its summer
vacation scheme from June and July
to September.
The reason for the change in
timetable was to avoid a clash
between the vacation scheme and
the firm’s redundancy consultation,
which took place over the summer.
Although most universities and
graduate diploma in law (GDL)
course providers haven’t yet
reconvened after the summer break,
30% of students have dropped out of
Wragges’ programme – the London
element of which starts next week.
The unusual timing means
the scheme takes place after
1 September, the date on which
most of the large firms traditionally
make training contract offers to
penultimate year law students.
Wragges’ training contract
assessment days will be conducted
at later dates than usual.
Meanwhile, the College of Law
has called for training contracts to
be scrapped. In a paper produced by
the College’s Legal Services Policy
Institute, chief executive Nigel Savage
contends that abolishing the twoyear training contract would “remove
a significant bottleneck in the
qualification process”.
He continued: “The fact that
successful completion of the LPC
does not guarantee the professional
title is a disincentive to students
making a significant investment of
their own resources... Employment
would still not be guaranteed,
but the availability of the professional
title is likely to mean that a wider
range of students would be
attracted.”
However, others suggest that
getting rid of training contracts
could lower the quality of solicitors.
Linklaters trainee development
partner Simon Firth said: “I have
some reservations about this.
Practical experience is very important
in order to do the job properly. The
LPC alone is not sufficient training to
be an effective lawyer.”
The evidence is clear
At Nottingham Law School you will be taught by
qualified lawyers who work closely with some of the
world’s leading firms. Our LPC is the only one to have
received the highest rating from the Law Society/SRA
every year since launch and we have gained an excellent
reputation as one of the best providers of training for
aspiring barristers. 90% of students who completed their
LPC and 73% of those who completed their BVC with
us in 2008 have secured a training contract, pupillage
or paralegal work. We offer a unique academic legal
community and we are proud of our professional focus.
You can choose to study in Nottingham or at our London
campus, which has been set up in partnership with
Kaplan Law School. So you won’t get a more authentic
learning experience or a better start to your professional
career. Case closed.
Law for lawyers, by lawyers.
Visit www.ntu.ac.uk/law
4 Legal Week Student
Autumn 2009
www.legalweek.com/students
BPP SIGNS DECHERT AND COL TARGETS IN-HOUSE
By Legal Week staff
Dechert has become the latest law
firm to sign an exclusive training deal
with an external provider.
The agreement, which started
in September, will see the AngloAmerican firm’s future UK trainees
study at BPP Law School in London,
Leeds or Manchester.
It takes the total number of major
law firms sending future trainees
exclusively to BPP to 18.
Meanwhile, the College of Law
has introduced a new professional
skills course targeted specifically at
those undertaking training contracts
in the legal teams of companies.
The course, which begins in October,
was designed by Rachel Short, who
spent nine years as a director in
the finance group at US investment
bank Citigroup.
It considers in-house lawyers’
duties to their employers, as well as
their relationship with third parties,
and also recognises that solicitors
working in-house will not have the
same level of regulatory support as
those working in law firms.
In other student news, the
Solicitors Regulation Authority
(SRA) has approved proposals for
a new Qualified Lawyers Transfer
Dechert: signed
agreement with
BPP Law School
‘THE NEW SCHEME
WILL BE FAIRER.
ALL SOLICITORS
QUALIFYING WILL
HAVE THE SAME
STANDARDS OF
KNOWLEDGE’
Jonathan Spencer, chair of the
Solicitors’ Regulation Authority’s
education and training committee
Scheme (QLTS). The scheme enables
internationally qualified lawyers,
barristers and Scottish and Northern
Irish solicitors to qualify as solicitors
in England and Wales.
The new QLTS will be open to
lawyers from more jurisdictions
than qualify presently. It includes
an English-language test for nonnative speakers and more objectively
assessed practical exercises.
Jonathan Spencer, chair of
the SRA’s education and training
committee, said: “We are confident
that the new scheme will be rigorous,
robust and fairer than the present
system, ensuring all solicitors
qualifying to practise in England
and Wales have the same standards
of knowledge, skills and intellect,
and meet the same test of character
and suitability.”
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www.legalweek.com/students
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
5
TRAINING CONTRACTS
THE JOB
SQUEEZE
First came the wave of training contract
deferrals, as many of the top law firms
scrambled to find volunteers to delay
their training contract start dates by a
year. Next, as the recession deepened,
recruitment targets (for training
contracts starting in 2011) were scaled
back, with Eversheds and Field Fisher
Waterhouse going so far as to close
their graduate recruitment programmes
altogether until next year. Then, during
the summer, firms took the opportunity
to cut headcount further by reducing
trainee retention rates on qualification to
approximately 70% – a significant drop
from the 90%-plus retention figures that
As the recession forces
law firms to reconsider
their business models,
the amount of training
places is falling. Alex
Aldridge takes a look
at what the future may
hold for law students
were the norm in the boom years.
As autumn arrives, the economy is
showing tentative signs of recovery, but
there is still a concern that there may not
be enough work around to sustain the
numbers of lawyers firms have become
used to employing. This is reflected in
the fact that intake targets for the latest
round of trainee recruitment (which
begins this month and continues until
31 July 2010, for training contracts
beginning in September 2012) have been
cut by 10%-25% at many firms, with
proportionate reductions being made in
vacation scheme numbers.
For the last five years, magic circle duo
THE COMPETITION IS MORE FIERCE THAN EVER
With its campaign to
get students to consider
the risk before pursuing
a career in law, the Law
Society is turning its
attention to the wide-eyed
law students at the very
beginning of their legal
careers. But it may be a case of too little too late.
The Law Society is now addressing a problem
which has required attention for some time, with
no one to date prepared to take responsibility.
For the past five years the number of Legal
Practice Course (LPC) places – and consequently
LPC graduates – has significantly exceeded the
number of training contracts available.
Over time, this has led to bitter competition
for places, not only at the magic circle firms,
who take on hundreds of trainees each year, but
also through the regions, on to the high street
and crucially in the long-suffering legal aid
firms. Many students have sat and re-sat exams,
completed hundreds of application forms and
been rewarded with letters of rejection.
News that a career in the law is no longer
an easy ride to a champagne lifestyle and
early retirement may not be a shock to
some, but for students who have been dazzled by
glossy brochures provided by law firms and LPC
providers, the reality can be hard to take.
6 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
The number of solicitors on the roll has
increased from 75,072 in 1998 to 112,433 in
2008, an increase of 49.8% in only 10 years.
Clearly the profession cannot sustain such a large
intake year on year. Demographic and economic
shifts have also meant that solicitors, along
with the rest of society, are working until much
later in life. A collapse in pension provisions,
salary freezes and a hollow property market will
all mean that senior partners are going to be
hanging around the office that much longer.
The imminent introduction of alternative
business structures will also be a shock to the
whole system as ‘Tesco law’ threatens the
traditional high street solicitor. At the same
time, anyone with their heart set on a career in
criminal law should take time out to consider the
anticipated effects of ‘Best Value Tendering’ on
the marketplace.
In 2008 there were 7,606 passes from
the LPC with 6,303 new training contracts
registered. Add to the mix the unfortunate
jobless LPC graduates from the past five years
(say, 6,500), barristers transferring (286 in
2008 and set to increase) and foreign lawyers
re-qualifying (1,593), and an even worse
picture emerges. On top of this there are all the
students who have had their training contracts
deferred or even cancelled, plus the mass of
recently laid-off lawyers.
Training contracts are, of course, only the
stepping stone. On the basis of this year’s newlyqualified solicitor retention rate figures to date, it
is forecast that the number of trainees not retained
by their firms upon qualification is likely to rise to
30% this September (from 10% 12 months ago).
So who is to blame? Is it the Solicitors
Regulation Authority for allowing LPC
institutions to expand their available places year
on year? Is it the LPC institutions for blinding
their paying customers with success stories and
branded pens?
Are the careers services to blame for being
overly upbeat? The students themselves for
not researching their careers? Or is it the credit
crunch and Gordon Brown?
But when it comes down to it, blame isn’t
too important. What needs to happen now is
for the profession to react in such a way that
new solicitors continue to be representative of
the society they serve. As competition becomes
fiercer, let’s hope that the profession does not
revert to the preserve of the old boys’ public
school network of yesteryear and true diversity
continues to succeed. That is the true challenge
facing the profession.
Kevin Poulter is member of the Law Society Junior Lawyers
Division board and a solicitor at Wake Smith & Tofields.
The views expressed in this article are not necessarily those
of the Junior Lawyers Division.
www.legalweek.com/students
Linklaters and Allen & Overy (A&O) have
each taken on at least 120 trainees a year.
This year, however, they plan to recruit 110
(to start in 2012), with A&O planning to
further reduce that figure to 105 during
the next couple of years.
“Our business has reduced in size by
around 10% as a result of the recent
restructuring. We think it is appropriate
to reduce our graduate intake by roughly
the same proportion so we can continue
to provide top quality training and keep
on as many trainees as possible on
qualification,” explains A&O graduate
recruitment partner Richard Hough.
Meanwhile, mid-tier pair Simmons &
Simmons and SJ Berwin, both of which
took on around 50 trainees a year during
the boom times, have cut their recruitment
targets for this year by 20% – meaning
each will offer 10 fewer training contract
places to 2012 starters. And Field Fisher
will cut its annual trainee intake from 20 to
15, which equates to a 25% fall.
The situation is made worse by the
increasing numbers of applications law
firms are receiving for training places.
Slaughter and May, for example, this year
received about 2,000 applications for 95
places in its 2011 intake – an increase
on previous years of about 10%. The
quality of those applying was also up,
said Slaughters executive partner Graham
www.legalweek.com/students
AN ERA OF UNPRECEDENTED CHANGE (YEAH, YEAH, YEAH)
Legal Week ’s editor Alex Novarese on why he’s sceptical about talk of
a paradigm shift in legal services
A senior partner asked me recently if I thought there was a revolution about to upset
the world of law. It would make better copy if I’d have said yes, but my answer was
no. Obviously, legal services will keep evolving and the UK will continue to be the most
liberal and dynamic market in world. There will be commoditisation, and it will be
surprising if some form of Tesco law does not emerge over the next 10 years (although
it probably won’t be Tesco doing it). Internationalisation of legal services will continue,
though we are now entering a period of polishing up and reorganising foreign practices, rather than the
scattergun expansion of the 1990s.
The impact of outside investment under the Legal Services Act is unknowable with so many variables at play. I
will say this: for high-end legal services, the more I hear financiers talk it up, the less convinced I am. Technology
will keep changing the profession, but probably not in the way everyone is expecting it, because that’s what
tends to happen with technology. But none of these forces are remotely new. Law has gone through wrenching
change over the last 50 years and will do again.
What I certainly don’t subscribe to is the weedy assumption that underpins so much punditry in professional
services: that we are in a time of unprecedented change and the pace of that change can only increase. It
sounds good, but history says otherwise.
Industries can sail on serenely for decades with little real development before suddenly being hit by disruptive
and violent shifts in technology and/or the buying habits of customers. Some industries are going through such
violent upheaval right now – but law isn’t one of them. Of course, a deep recession makes this kind of hyperbole
more prevalent. You don’t have to be a market bull to believe that Goldman Sachs was onto something when it
recently dubbed the current crisis ‘The Facebook Recession’.
After all, an economic shock roughly equivalent to the early 1980s recession has been routinely referred to as
‘unprecedented’. In the internet age, everyone feels the need to shout to gain attention, whether what they are
saying is credible or not.
There is another reason I find myself unconvinced that we are set for radical upheaval in law (at least more
radical than seen over the last 15 years). That is that the people making the case aren’t making it very well. That
leads to the conclusion that either that the revolution isn’t coming, or if it is, it’s sneaking up on us unawares.
But then no one ever made a buck admitting they can’t predict the future.
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
7
TRAINING CONTRACTS
White, with many candidates who might
have formerly favoured investment
banking or private equity opting instead
for the relative security of law.
A temporary measure?
The question anxious prospective lawyers
are asking is whether the cuts in trainee
intake will be a temporary measure or the
beginning of a lasting trend.
Field Fisher’s HR director Charlie Keeling
thinks that it may be the latter: “The law
firm business model is changing, and as
a result I am not confident about a return
to previous graduate recruitment levels,”
he says. “The demand for greater value
among law firm clients who are under
pressure to reduce legal spend, and
resultant cost-cutting initiatives such as
outsourcing, could hit trainees.”
Simmons graduate recruitment officer
Anna King has a similar take: “While it is
hard to predict, I can see numbers staying
slightly reduced, particularly with the
offshoring arrangement we have recently
put in place whereby some commoditised
work is being sent abroad,” she says,
adding that the firm hopes to give the
trainees it does take on higher quality
training than before: “We have just started
running a legal MBA for our trainees; one
of the aims of which will be to give them
greater responsibility and make their
learning experience a better quality.”
And even Slaughters’ White – one
of the firms still not to have cut trainee
intake targets – believes clients’ quest for
better value for money could hit graduate
recruitment in the future. “Clients may
object increasingly to firms putting
trainees on a file, which could obviously
lead to a change in the pattern of the law
firm business model, with the pyramid’s
base becoming narrower,” he says.
Others, however, downplay the
potential impact of changes being brought
about by pressures to cut costs:
“We have never done any offshoring
and, frankly, we have no intention to do
it. But where it does occur elsewhere,
I understand that what gets offshored
are the unskilled, repetitive tasks that
we wouldn’t want our trainees doing
anyway,” says SJ Berwin graduate
recruitment partner Bryan Pickup.
Meanwhile, Linklaters trainee
development partner Simon Firth suggests
that graduate recruitment levels may creep
back up again as the economy recovers.
“Essentially, graduate recruitment is
governed by attrition rates which at the
moment are down at quite low levels.
I suspect that once the recession is
over attrition will go back up again,”
Firth comments.
“Having said that, a lot of the attrition
comes from people leaving law firms to
go to banks – and now banks are much
smaller than they used to be pre-crisis. So
it is hard to say.”
8 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
With law firms recruiting so far in
advance – and difficult-to-predict variables
at play such as the Legal Services Act
(which from 2011 will, among other things,
allow outside investors to buy into law
firms and non-lawyers to become partners)
– it is no surprise that graduate recruiters
are not keen on making concrete forecasts.
But, whatever happens, it is worth
remembering that the falls in graduate
recruitment targets are from peak levels
that in many cases only existed for four
or five years when the economy was
running at full pelt. Intake at SJ Berwin
and Simmons, for example, was around
40 trainees per year in 2004 – the same
as the reduced 2012 targets. However,
A&O has recruited 120 trainees annually
for around 10 years, making the cuts being
brought into this year’s recruitment round
significant.
Of course, worrying about all of this is
futile for students enrolled on law degrees
and Graduate Diploma in Law courses.
Instead, graduate recruitment partners
advise aspiring lawyers to devote their
energy to making applications stand out
from the crowd. According to White this
means: “Avoiding gimmicks – we get some
awful ones, such as photo collages of
applicants – and providing evidence that
you are genuinely interested in law as a
career. Something that demonstrates you
have got a life beyond law helps, too.”
THE IN-HOUSE OPTION
Keen to cut costs by doing more of their legal work internally
– rather than sending it out to law firms – increasing numbers
of companies are recruiting their own trainees.
Barclays Capital (BarCap), British Telecom and Centrica
are among companies to offer training contracts. A reflection
of the trend is the fact that last month the College of
Law introduced a new professional skills course targeted
specifically at those undertaking training contracts in the legal
teams of companies.
“Trainees are a great investment for companies as they
learn about the ways of the business at a very early stage,”
says Centrica general counsel Peter Roberts, formerly a partner
at US firm Jones Day.
“By contrast, many of the junior lawyers we meet from the
law firms are very unworldly, without any real awareness of
where the work comes from.”
Roberts added that the relationship Centrica has with
its team of panel law firms – which includes Allen & Overy,
Ashurst, Eversheds, Herbert Smith, Linklaters and Slaughter
and May – means that trainees get at least six months
experience working in a private practice environment.
Francis Dickinson, legal director at BarCap – whose firstever five graduate legal trainees completed their training
contracts last month – urges law students with an interest in
business to consider training in-house, stating: “Legal training
within an investment bank offers unparalleled experience and
access to the business.”
Graduates on the BarCap legal training programme
complete four six-month rotations among various teams within
the department, and attend finance and business classes, in
addition to the required regulatory courses for solicitors.
www.legalweek.com/students
FRESHFIELDS BRUCKHAUS DERINGER LLP
EXPERIENCE LIFE AT FRESHFIELDS
We offer our trainees a breadth of training,
opportunity and experience that few firms
can match – so it’s not surprising that many
of our lawyers have amazing stories to tell.
This is due to the nature of our firm – truly
international with over 2,500 lawyers in 27
key business centres around the world – and
to the flexibility of our training programme.
You can choose up to eight different seats,
spend time in one of our overseas offices
or go on secondment to one of our clients
(and sometimes do both).
It’s no wonder the people who work with us
have such an eclectic range of experiences
to look back on over their careers.
And as you’ll be working with and learning
from some of the most talented business
lawyers in the world, you’ll gain the
experience and knowledge you need to
become not just a world-class lawyer
but a trusted business advisor too.
Find out more at:
www.freshfields.com/uktrainees
CAREER CLINIC
Is my non-Russell Group first worth anything?
Do law firms really look at people with degrees outside the top universities at all? I ask because I qualified with a first class degree in
law last year, but have yet to secure a training contract. I got good grades in my GCSEs but my A-levels weren’t great (for one reason
or another) so I had to accept a place at a university with a pretty average reputation. However, once I got there I worked hard,
enjoyed the course and got a first.
I’ve been trying to get a training contract at a good law firm since then and still have had no luck – I’m assuming because of low
A-level grades. I thought a first might be enough for them to make an exception, but I’m guessing the university I went to is counting
against me. Sometimes I think I’d have been better off with a 2:2 from Oxford. But I really want to work for a major firm. It is worth
holding out to get a firm I really want to join or should I apply to smaller firms to get on the career ladder? I really don’t want to do the
LPC without funding.
I would have thought it is obvious that in
the current market academic qualifications
alone are not enough to secure a training
contract.
I graduated this year with a strong 2:1
(68%) from a university ranked 50-60 in
the Times List. I have had five assessment
days/interviews for 2011 training contracts
– two in London and three leading
national firms.
This is because of my depth of work
experience and extra curricular. I worked
part time as a paralegal in my third year,
I have also done a vacation scheme in
house with a global company and some
pro bono work. This means you actually
have something to talk about on the
application form/interviews.
I have no legal connections
whatsoever... I am a great fan of increasing
diversity within the legal profession and
from the people I have encountered in the
City I would agree that securing a TC with
a MC or top 15 firm is very unlikely unless
you have been to a Russell Group uni.
However, if you were that determined
you would have already acquired a wealth
of work experience. Man
My advice to you would be to apply for
work experience (be it formal vac schemes
or otherwise) and TCs at a slightly larger
range of firms. Think firms within the
top 20-40. After doing work experience
for these (sometimes) less academically
snobby firms, you may find that you
don’t need to apply to firms that have
the ‘prestigious’ name to find the kind
of training and prospects you desire.
National Firm
I also got a first from a non-Russell
Group uni (graduated in 2008), which
probably has a worse reputation than your
university. It only comes in the bottom 20
of the Times ranking list.
Subsequent to this I have obtained a TC
at a top 15 law firm (starting 2011) and
have just completed my Master of Laws at
a Russell group university.
My experience was very positive during
interviews at firms and at no time did I
10 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
get a sense that it really mattered that I
was not from a Russell Group university.
Interviewers seemed genuinely impressed
that I had a first even though it was not
from a top-tier university.
To increase my chances of securing a
TC I tried to get experience that was not
necessarily at a firm, but rather experience
that improved my business acumen.
For example, I worked in-house at
a bank. This seemed to count for a lot,
and I really believe it gave me a genuine
advantage over other candidates because
many of the questions I was asked at
interviews revolved around my (very
limited) business experience and other
extracurricular activities. Anonymous
It is well known in academia that the
highest university grades are often
achieved by the students who did not
get the highest grades at A level for their
intake. The smartest ones often kick back
thinking their A-levels will carry them
through, often to a safe 2:1. Whereas
I worked
in-house at
a bank. This
seemed to
count for
a lot and
I really
believe it
gave me
a genuine
advantage
over other
candidates
those, who like you, worked hard can get
the first. Anon
As someone who regularly interviews
people applying for TCs at a large
commercial firm, I can say your degree is
definitely a plus.
Many firms use A-levels as an initial
filter to cut the number of applications
down to a manageable size for more
detailed review – we get about 3,000 a
year, and we apply such a filter, but there
is scope to put in an explanation for poor
A-level results. What you really need to do
is demonstrate there is more to you than
academic achievement. Relevant (legal
or commercial) work experience, extracurricular activities at university, anything
to show you are serious and committed
about what you are applying for.
And when you get to interview, you’ll
find it goes a lot easier if there’s stuff
on your form to talk about – because as
an interviewer I often struggle to find
anything interesting to discuss. John
www.legalweek.com/students
Can I work and train at the same time?
I graduated last year and am about to begin my GDL, which I planned to do full-time. However, I’ve recently become really concerned
about taking out a loan, especially the thought of ending up without a TC and having to make those hefty loan repayments. So I’d
rather work full-time and pay as I study.
I have finally managed to get a job offer from a local authority for a graduate position – the pay is good and it seems like a great
opportunity. The only problem is that if I accept the job I am expected to study for a Masters degree part-time, which they pay for,
and I get a one day off in the week to study.
How am I meant to study a GDL part-time while working full-time and studying for a Masters part-time as well? I am tempted to take
the job and study both courses part-time, and I know the College of Law offers a weekend part-time GDL. Am I naive thinking this can be
done? Should I just reject this decent job and find something else? Or should I take the job, study the masters and put my GDL on hold?
If I were you, I would accept the local
authority job and do the masters they are
funding. I would defer the GDL place and
use this year to find a training contract.
I think doing a full-time job, a parttime masters, the GDL and searching for
a training contract all at the same time
sounds like a recipe for disaster.
I don’t think you can do justice to all
the different balls you will be juggling
and coming out of the GDL with a substandard mark is not going to impress any
firms, even if you show that you have been
working etc. You are looking at a sevenday working week: your theoretical energy
and enthusiasm are admirable, but I think
impractical.
The experience you get working for the
local authority and the masters will sound
interesting on TC applications, even if it
isn’t directly relevant in all areas. Or...
I did it, admittedly not at the same time as
a masters! All my holiday and most of my
weekends were given over to study and
revision for two years while I worked full
time in a law firm. It was hard but do-able.
My only comment is that the providers of
the Legal Practice Course (as it then was)
treated the part-time course as a cash cow,
so there was very little support apart from
a hot-line during exams. Go for it but put
your personal life on hold. Percy
job in itself and for several years most of
my annual leave was blown on revision
and exams. (Don’t get me wrong – It was
worth it in the long run.) However, if you
try to take on too much, you risk doing
nothing properly or effectively.
Delay the GDL. Give the market an
extra year or so to pick up, during which
time you can gather experience and an
additional qualification that many other TC
applicants won’t have.
Gaining experience and qualifications
that will set you apart from other
applicants will be more advantageous in
the long run than trying to cram in the GDL
as quickly as possible. Nearly NQ
I also studied for the GDL part-time
while studying full-time and managed to
maintain a pretty good social life and still
achieved a commendation on the GDL.
It was, however, very difficult – never
underestimate how tired you’ll be after a
full day at work.
Even the most motivated people on
my course sometimes struggled to stay
awake for the three hours of lectures after
It is not
realistic to
think you
can hold
down a fulltime job
and do two
part-time
courses
work twice a week. You’ll also need a
very understanding and flexible employer
if you’re going to study part-time for the
GDL.
If you’re serious about a career in law
then take your training seriously – don’t
juggle it with commitments that will
drastically reduce the amount of effort you
can put into your GDL. You’ll end up with
poor marks on the GDL (a tough course),
poor performance at work and poor marks
in your masters degree.
No matter how clever you may think you
are (like most graduates straight out of
uni), juggling all three is simply a recipe for
disaster. Part-timer
Studying for four years part-time while
maintaining a full time job is not only
managaeable, it shows dedication that will
make you stand out of the crowd.
Having achieved an average degree,
I was forced to take this option – and I
didn’t get one day per week off – I had to
use my annual leave entitlement to revise
and work weekends. This didn’t prevent
me obtaining first class honours and a
training contract with a top firm. Anon
It is not realistic to think you can hold
down a full-time job and do two part-time
courses. It maybe OK in the first month,
but then the home study pressures will
increase and self-discipline will be tested.
Don’t bite off more than you can chew. It
will only leave you failing in all fronts and
greatly disillusioned. Anonymous
I did a degree, LPC and Masters
(consecutively) all part-time while holding
down a full-time job. Doing any one
part-time course while studying is quite
achievable, especially if they’ll give you a
day off for study.
You’ll be taking on too much if you try
to work and do two courses concurrently.
My part-time LPC was like an additional
www.legalweek.com/students
Legal Week Autumn 2009
11
STEP BY STEP
STEP 1: Get your degree
A qualifying law degree is traditionally
the first step on the road to becoming
a solicitor. It will exempt you from the
Common Professional Examination (CPE)
or Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL),
provided it covers all seven foundations of
legal knowledge: obligations I (contract)
and II (tort); criminal law; equity and law of
trusts; European Union (EU) law; property
law; and public law.
However, an extra hurdle awaits
applicants for many of the UK’s leading
universities, following the introduction
of the National Admissions Test for Law
(LNAT), a uniform legal exam that must
be completed before advancing to the
undergraduate law courses of participating
universities.
The following universities are signed
up to LNAT: University of Birmingham,
University of Bristol, University of
Cambridge, Durham University, NUI
Maynooth, University of Exeter, University
of Glasgow, King’s College London,
University of Nottingham, University of
Oxford and University College London
Registration for this year’s exam for
entry can be completed online from
1 August and costs £40 within the EU.
Further details are available here. Once
a law degree is completed, you can then
apply for the Legal Practice Course (LPC).
Firms may not be as Oxbridgedominated as in the past, but most of the
larger practices are still more impressed
by graduates from more traditional
universities. However, if you have a good,
non-academic reason for choosing a new
university over an old one, this may be
taken into account.
Second-year law students and final year
non-law students should bear in mind that
this is the optimal time to apply for training
contracts – with most firms recruiting over
two years in advance of scheduled start
dates. It helps to do a vacation scheme
with the sort of firm you are looking to
work for before making the actual training
contract application. Generally, summer
vacation schemes can be applied for from
around January in the year which they take
place.
STEP 2: If you do not have a
qualifying law degree, you
will have to take the Common
Professional Examination (CPE) or
Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL)
How long? One year (full-time); two years
(part-time).
How much? Up to £8,735.
When to apply: Third/final year of first
degree.
Although the main route to becoming
a solicitor is via a law degree, there is
evidence that many law firms actually
prefer candidates to go through the
CPE/GDL route, due to the wider range
of experience they get. The CPE/GDL
12 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
comprises an examination in each of the
seven foundations of legal knowledge,
plus one other area of legal study. The
course is offered by a multitude of
institutions across the country, from
universities to traditional law schools
(details of providers are on the Solicitors
Regulation Authority website). While
applicants for part-time courses should
contact the relevant college directly,
applications for full-time courses are made
centrally to: CPE Applications Board, PO
Box 84, Guildford, Surrey GU3 1YX. Forms
can be downloaded from lawcabs.ac.uk
or completed online. Distance learning
options are also available from a number
of providers.
Competition for places on the course
can be fierce, especially for the toprated colleges. The more popular
schools, such as The College of Law and
Nottingham Law School, are considerably
oversubscribed. When awarding places,
the primary consideration is academic
achievement and the minimum degree
grade is a 2:2. However, the majority of
students hold a 2:1 or better. Full-time
students have three years in which to
complete the CPE/GDL. Except in extreme
circumstances, a candidate cannot sit
for an examination on more than three
occasions. Completion of the CPE/GDL
does not automatically guarantee a place
on the LPC. However, there are some
institutions that do guarantee places if
the CPE is passed at the same college. So
check this when applying.
It is also worth investigating the law
firm contacts your CPE course provider
has. These can be helpful in securing that
all-important vacation placement. As with
a qualifying law degree, the LPC must be
started within seven years of passing the
CPE or GDL, or you will have to start again.
Those with training contracts in place may
receive a maintenance grant, with many
City firms now offering around £7,000
towards living expenses, as well as having
their tuition fees paid.
STEP 3: Legal Practice Course
(LPC)
How long? One year (full-time); two years
(part-time).
How much? Up to £12,500.
When to apply: The final year of a
qualifying law degree or, for non-law
graduates, at the beginning of your
CPE/GDL course. Application forms are
available from September until 1 December
in the year prior to you requiring a place.
While a law degree or CPE/GDL is
academic in nature, the LPC features
a more practical approach, ensuring
trainee solicitors have the knowledge
and skills they need in their first two
years of practice, when they undertake
their training contracts. LPCs can vary
considerably in content and assessment
methods, particularly at the elective stage.
Legal Week
Student spells
out the steps all
aspiring solicitors
need to take
So it is important that you get a copy of
the prospectus of the college(s) you are
interested in before you apply.
In 2006, five top City law firms
struck a deal with BPP Law School to
incorporate elements of MBA-style
business training into the LPC, in a
pioneering attempt to bring business
training into legal education.
Further developments have seen greater
emphasis placed on business awareness
and management skills, as well as the
advent of LPCs tailored to individual City
firms, meaning students must give extra
thought to their preferred career path from
an earlier stage. Many City firms also offer
financial assistance to future trainees, with
contributions of up to £7,000 towards
living expenses for LPC students with
training contracts.
Despite the widening differences
between individual courses, the basic
framework laid down by the Law Society
remains in place, with courses broken
www.legalweek.com/students
HOW TO
BECOME A
SOLICITOR
down into five broad areas: core;
compulsory; pervasive; skills; and elective.
‘Core’ covers ethics, basic skills, taxation,
the European ‘context’ and probate/
administration of estates. ‘Compulsory’
consists of litigation and advocacy,
business law and practice, and property
law and practice.
‘Pervasive’ areas are those that should
be considered in the context of the
other areas of the course. They comprise
professional conduct and client care,
EU law, revenue law, accounts, and
the Human Rights Act. ‘Skills’ includes
practical legal research, writing and
drafting, interviewing and advising, and
advocacy.
As the name suggests, ‘elective’
requires that three subjects are studied
from a range of corporate and private
client topics. If you already have a training
contract, your firm will probably give you
some guidance as to which electives it
expects you to take. For those without a
www.legalweek.com/students
training contract, tailoring your electives to
the type of firms to which you are applying
will certainly help in future job interviews.
STEP 4: The training contract
How long? Two years.
How much? They pay you! The Law
Society-recommended minimum salary
is £18,590 in London and £16,650 in the
rest of England and Wales. City law firm
trainee salaries go up to £40,000.
When to apply: In the second year of a
qualifying law degree or the final year of
any other degree. The bonus of winning
a training contract is that, with the larger
firms at least, you get your CPE/GDL/
LPC fees paid and can often receive an
additional maintenance grant. However, it
is not game over if you do not get taken on
by the time you leave university. Plenty of
people do start the CPE and LPC without a
training contract.
The format of the training contract can
vary substantially, with larger firms tending
to have a more structured programme
than smaller firms. Law Society guidelines
stipulate that in all cases you must be
allocated a ‘training principal’ (who must
be a partner or solicitor of equivalent
status), who will monitor and appraise
your work.
They will also keep training records
(although it is recommended that you
keep your own training diary in case of
Law Society spot-checks, and for your
CV should you decide to apply elsewhere
later). The training principal can then
delegate your day-to-day monitoring to a
supervisor.
The Law Society has a checklist of
training requirements. It should be
completed by the end of the training
contract. The supervisor is responsible
for providing the trainee with sufficient
balanced and useful work, to answer
your questions and to give guidance and
feedback on your performance.
Whether you train in a large or small
firm, your experiences should be varied. In
a larger firm you usually get the advantage
of experiencing a variety of departments
and different supervisors.
Wherever you train, by the end of the
contract you should have been allowed
the opportunity to practise communication
and support skills, legal research, drafting,
interviewing and advising.
In addition, you should have gained
experience in negotiation and advocacy, as
well as oral presentation skills. You must
gain experience of at least three practice
areas. These should encompass both noncontentious and contentious work, and
an ‘appreciation and understanding’ of
litigation. Brush up on the research skills
you learned at law school because they
will be called upon often.
Do not be seduced by the legal culture
of long hours merely for the sake of
appearance. But, by the same token,
try not to be first out of the door in the
evening. Present yourself as enthusiastic
and willing to learn and do not be put
off by the mystique surrounding many
legal concepts.
Nothing is that difficult and explanation
is just a question away. You have been
taken on as a trainee, not a consultant, so
questions are expected.
During your training contract, you
will have to complete the professional
skills course before you can be admitted
as a solicitor. The course is divided into
three compulsory components: financial
and business skills; advocacy and
communications skills; and ethics and
client responsibilities.
According to our research, most firms
retain between 75% and 100% of their
trainees. However, this does not mean
surviving the training contract is easy; the
same qualities that will see you through
the recruitment process will be needed
during the training contract.
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
13
LAW SCHOOLS
Within a decade, training for major law firms has
switched to exclusive provider deals. Alex Aldridge
asks how much further the revolution is set to run
The last few years have seen the College
of Law, BPP Law School and, to a lesser
extent, Kaplan Law School jostle with
each other to secure tie-ups with the top
law firms. In the main, firms have been
receptive to their advances, with the result
being that the vast majority of UK top 20
law firms – and many top 50 firms and
US firms with London offices – now have
arrangements in place to send their future
trainees to study the Graduate Diploma in
Law (GDL) and Legal Practice Course (LPC)
exclusively with a certain course provider.
It is a very different picture to the
situation 10 years ago when the first
law school-law firm tie-up was initiated
between eight City firms (known as the
‘City consortium’) and BPP, Nottingham
Law School and the Oxford Institute of
Legal Practice. Under the agreement,
students with training contracts with
the firms involved – Slaughter and May,
Clifford Chance (CC), Linklaters, Allen
& Overy (A&O), Freshfields Bruckhaus
Deringer, Herbert Smith, Lovells and
Norton Rose – were taught a revamped,
more commercially-focused LPC in groups
alongside other future City consortium
trainees at whichever of the three law
schools was most convenient to them.
Outside of the consortium, there were
no other agreements between firms and
course providers.
When the consortium deal expired
in 2005, the College of Law signed up
magic circle trio CC, Linklaters and A&O
as inaugural members of its new Cityfocused LPC programme. BPP retained the
remaining five consortium members, with
Nottingham Law School and the Oxford
Institute dropped from the arrangement.
From that point it was open season, as
BPP and the College of Law went head
to head in respective bids to secure as
many tie-ups with law firms as possible,
with the newly formed Kaplan Law School
– a spin-off of US education provider
Kaplan which launched in association
with Nottingham Law School in 2007
– also muscling in on the scene to take
a few significant scalps. So far, BPP has
focused on getting City firms on board,
strengthening the reputation it established
through the original City consortium as
a specialist provider of legal education
with a financial slant. The College of Law
‘I’m not
saying cost
isn’t a factor,
it’s just that
other factors,
namely
convenience
and
consistency,
are much
more
significant’
Peter Crisp, BPP
Law School
14 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
Corbis
ALL TIED UP
has cast its net wider, adding a host of
major regional firms, including Wragge
& Co and Halliwells, to its magic circle
base, alongside smaller, quality outfits
such as media law specialist Harbottle &
Lewis. The new kid on the block Kaplan
has taken a similar approach, adding firms
such as Trowers & Hamlins, Bird & Bird
and Penningtons to its initial deal with
Anglo-American firm Mayer Brown. The
most recent round of tie-ups has seen the
College of Law sign an exclusive LPC and
GDL deal with Denton Wilde Sapte, BPP do
likewise with Withers and Kaplan secure
agreements with Mills & Reeve and Field
Fisher Waterhouse.
What’s in it for us?
The attraction of tie-ups to law schools is
obvious: they get more students, while at
the same time squeezing out of the market
rival providers, such as the Oxford Institute
of Legal Practice and the University of the
West of England, which have opted not
to go down the exclusive route. Plus, by
www.legalweek.com/students
so that they feel part of the family from
an earlier stage.” Meanwhile, Slaughters
head of training Louise Stoker highlights
the usefulness of having students study
identical content: “Having all your trainees
do the same LPC means you know exactly
what they know and, more importantly,
what they don’t know – meaning we can
align our subsequent internal training
accordingly,” she says.
The LPCs offered by
the top providers are
all pretty high standard
and leave students wellequipped to pursue a
career in private practice
associating themselves with leading firms,
the College of Law, BPP and Kaplan are
boosting their own brands – making them
more likely to attract students without
training contracts who are keen to get
a well known law school on their CVs to
maximise their chances of landing a job.
“Our experience is that students without a
training contract are attracted to a training
provider with a good selection of firms on
its books,” explains Kaplan Law School
head of business development Peter
Anderson.
Firms say the appeal of an exclusive
agreement with a course provider lies,
aside from the inclusion of City-focused
training, in the various advantages that
stem from having your next intake at the
same institution. Jeremy Cape, trainee
partner at Dentons, says that the central
factor behind his firm’s tie-up with the
College of Law was that it will allow them
greater access to future trainees: “It will
mean we can do talks and drinks with
them much more easily than otherwise
www.legalweek.com/students
THE COLLEGE OF LAW
LAW FIRM TIE-UPS
Allen & Overy
Ashurst
Baker & McKenzie
Barlow Lyde & Gilbert
Berwin Leighton Paisner
Brabners Chaffe Street
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton
Clifford Chance
Cobbetts
Denton Wilde Sapte
Halliwells
Harbottle & Lewis
Hill Dickinson
Linklaters
Pannone
Pinsent Masons
Stevens & Bolton
Weil Gotshal & Manges
Wragge & Co
No doubt the issue of cost also figures
in firms’ decision-making on tie-ups,
with providers offering discounts to firms
which send large amounts of students
their way. “There is obviously a deal to be
done in any market if you bring volume
to a training provider,” says Kaplan Law
School’s Anderson. However, BPP Law
School chief executive Peter Crisp plays
down the role of discounts: “I’m not
saying cost isn’t a factor, it’s just that
other factors, namely convenience and
consistency, are much more significant,”
he says. Off the record, recruitment
partners at the leading City firms go along
with this, with one stating: “It is actually
surprising how little all this has to do with
money in terms of actual course fees.
While there is a range of fees offered
outside the standard advertised rates, it is
not massive – and, to be honest, each firm
is spending so much money per trainee
that any discount you get from a provider
is not going to make a huge difference.”
Of course, not all firms go for exclusive
deals with course providers, with some
– including Olswang, Clyde & Co and
DLA Piper – keen to give their trainees
flexibility over where they study. Clydes,
which has a preferred list of course
providers that it recommends to trainees,
explains its stance accordingly: “We
believe that by giving our trainees their
choice of institution and location they
will be able to tailor their studies to
their own learning styles and personal
circumstances, which only enhances their
experience and success.”
Which law school?
Having made the decision to form an
exclusive LPC/GDL agreement, how do
firms decide on which law school to sign
up with? Existing relationships between
firms and course providers play a part,
as do the quality of pitches made by the
providers, say recruitment partners. But
a major part of it seems to come down to
preferences for the various different course
models offered.
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
15
LAW SCHOOLS
The College of Law distinguishes
itself from the competition through its
individually tailored courses which see
future trainees taught in separate groups
using standard firm documents. Firms are
given the opportunity to get quite heavily
involved in the design and delivery of the
course. “This allows some firms to be
very hands-on,” says Sarah Hutchinson,
director of business development at the
College of Law, “with Halliwells, for
example, sending in associates to co-teach
with our tutors.” (The College of Law
also offers a one-size-fits-all City focused
LPC for firms not wanting such hands-on
involvement.)
BPP, on the other hand, bases its course
design on collective input from its five City
consortium members, and this month will
be launching an accelerated LPC (with
course length reduced to seven and a half
months).
“The recession won’t be here forever
and the accelerated programme will
be ideal for consortium firms because
it means that they can take trainees
immediately after they’ve completed the
course,” says BPP’s Crisp.
Kaplan Law School, which teaches
Nottingham Law School’s well regarded
GDL and LPC, trades on its smaller size:
“It means we can give students that
greater personal touch,” says Anderson.
KAPLAN LAW
FIRM TIE-UPS
Bates Wells & Braithwaite
Bird & Bird
Field Fisher Waterhouse
Manches
Mayer Brown
Mills & Reeve (for students studying in
London only)
Nabarro
Penningtons
Trowers & Hamlins
Linklaters trainee development partner
Simon Firth thinks the College of Law
approach gives its future trainees an edge:
“Being involved in the course design
means that we can make it as relevant to
our practice as possible – so, for example,
it includes an international disputes
module, which isn’t typical,” he comments.
“And using Linklaters precedents means
that when students arrive as trainees
they are already familiar with them.” The
result, he continues, is that trainees are
more motivated during their LPC year and
join the firm “further up the training curve
than before”.
However, Slaughters’ Stoker argues that
the consortium model is more effective in
the long term: “Sharing the course design
with other firms is an efficient way to
work that makes use of all our expertise.
Plus we have always felt that it is healthy
for students to mix with people from
other firms as it gives them a network of
people they may come across later in their
careers.” She adds that the use of firmspecific documents could put trainees at a
disadvantage when they have to deal with
documents from other firms during cases
and transactions.
But, whatever their preferences, most
agree that the LPCs offered by the top
providers are all pretty high standard and
leave students well-equipped to pursue
a career in private practice. “A lot of
it is marketing spiel,” commented one
recruitment partner.
“And the fact is that anyone doing an
LPC at a reasonable institution followed
by a training contract at a leading firm is
going to be pretty well positioned to have
a decent career.”
Dentons’ Cape expresses a similar
sentiment: “I don’t think we’ve got to
a point where someone can point to a
trainee and say ‘that’s a BPP LPC graduate
and that’s a College of Law one.’”
Still, there are no signs that the law
school-law firm link up trend is set to slow,
‘We have
always felt that
it is healthy for
students to mix
with people
from other firms
as it gives them
a network of
people they
may come
across later in
their careers’
Louise Stoker, Slaughter
and May
16 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
with several further tie-ups expected to
be announced in the next few weeks.
And after the top 50 are all signed up,
course providers may begin to look
internationally.
“The challenge for the future will be
matching what we do on a domestic front
with global education and training,”
says College of Law chief executive Nigel
Savage. “Because at some stage firms
will want the same training for their 30
new recruits in India as they do for their
domestic kids.”
BPP LAW FIRM TIE-UPS
Addleshaw Goddard
CMS Cameron McKenna
Dechert
Dewey & LeBoeuf
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
Herbert Smith
Jones Day
Lovells
Macfarlanes
Norton Rose
Reed Smith
Reynolds Porter Chamberlain
SJ Berwin
Simmons & Simmons
Slaughter and May
Taylor Wessing
Travers Smith
Withers
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BAR
What is the best way
for a deferred trainee
to spend their year
off? Monika Ghose
investigates
STAY ON YOUR TOES
PRO BONO POSSIBILITIES
Emily Kearns, 24, spotted an
opportunity when her firm,
Herbert Smith, asked future
trainees to volunteer for deferrals.
Kearns saw it as a chance to
gain experience outside the
corporate and commercial fields.
She is currently doing a sixmonth internship at Fair Trials
International.
“I don’t give out legal advice here, but I do get involved in legal
research, handling client cases and file management,” she says.
“I recently assisted a case worker in drafting a submission to
Jack Straw on the Michael Shields case, which was very exciting.
It has been a brilliant experience. Taking time out to do this has
informed my opinion about what I want to do. I will be working in
commercial, but I would like to do more public law, judicial review
and pro bono work. I know Herbert Smith provides secondments to
Liberty so I would like to get involved there too.”
Kearns was able to find her placement through Herbert Smith’s
corporate social responsibility team, which provides deferred
trainees with a list of organisations they can apply to for experience.
“There is definitely stuff available for people if they try – I spread
my net quite widely and enquired at several places for an internship.
If I hadn’t been able to get a place I would have probably gone
travelling with the £7,000 deferment package I received from
Herbert Smith,” she says. “I would definitely recommend getting
involved in pro bono or charity work - it is a really great experience
which enhances your skills and, of course, looks good on your CV.”
18 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
‘Deferred trainees
are going to take up
their training contracts
– alongside trainees who
haven’t been deferred
– as part of a very large
herd and competition for
full-time positions upon
qualification is going to
be sky high’
Peter Roberts, Centrica
Earlier this year many of the top law
firms asked volunteers to defer their
training contract start dates – and in
some cases gave trainees-to-be no choice
in the matter.
Some firms, including Norton Rose and
Clifford Chance, accompanied deferrals
with the payment of generous sums of up
to £11,000 to students holding off for a
year. Others, such as Shoosmiths, declined
to pay anything.
In either case, with economic recovery
looking likely to be a slow process and
law firm business models changing,
deferred trainees can’t afford to rest on
their laurels.
When they take up their training
contracts they will be doing so in a market
flooded with junior lawyers.
And in order to make the cut and be
taken on full-time after their training many
within the profession are urging deferred
trainees to do as much as possible during
their gap years to make themselves
standout from the crowd.
Peter Roberts, a former partner at
Jones Day and now general counsel at
utilities company Centrica, says: “Deferred
trainees are going to take up their training
contracts – alongside trainees who
haven’t been deferred – as part of a very
large herd and competition for full-time
www.legalweek.com/students
positions upon qualification is going to be
sky high.”
As a result, he recommends that
gap years are spent doing something
as relevant to future careers in law
as possible.
“So, rather than spend the year whale
watching somewhere, it would be much
better to do something that’s adventurous
and different, but relevant to law.
“An example would be going off to
spend six months with, say, the director
of public prosecutions in Brisbane, which
could then potentially count to a few
months off your litigation seat during a
training contract – putting you at the head
of the queue.”
Looked at with the right attitude,
Roberts adds, the current market
could prove to be an opportunity for
deferred trainees:
“As Shakespeare wrote, ‘There is a
tide in the affairs of men, Which, taken at
the flood, leads on to fortune’– and law
students should keep this message in mind
at the moment.”
Graduate recruiters echo Roberts’
sentiments, advising deferred students not
to simply bum around for a year.
Vivian Ball, head of recruitment at CMS
Cameron McKenna, says: “We would
recommend getting some commercial
experience in either legal or non-legal
work, perhaps as a paralegal.
“But it would be good for them
to broaden their horizons – by doing
voluntary work, travelling or working
MY CITY GAP YEAR
Sarah Bridge, a trainee at CMS
Cameron McKenna, took time out
before her law conversion course
by working in recruitment in the
City of London.
“I travelled quite a bit while at university
so I thought that taking time out to gain
skills would be no bad thing,” she says.
“I was 75% sure I wanted to do law,
but I wanted to be 100% sure. Law is
such as long road and as I had done a
geography degree, I knew it would take two years to convert,” she
says.
“I thought recruitment would teach me new skills and add a few
strings to my bow. It was like doing a practice run.”
Bridge feels that her employment skills were improved greatly by
her decision to work as a recruiter.
“I’m not sure I would have been offered a training contract if I
hadn’t done it. It has improved my communication skills, enabled
me to become familiar with responsibility and the working day.
Also, recruitment is a tough environment to work in, and I feel it has
toughened me up.
“I take things less personally, and am slightly less worried about
making mistakes. It has bumped up my confidence and it gives a
good impression at interview.”
abroad. Anything ‘productive’ or
interesting would be good.”
Clare Harris, associate director of
legal resourcing at Lovells, adds: “We
haven’t been prescriptive about what
deferred students should be doing. We
have a monthly email newsletter in which
we highlight opportunities, such as
charity work.”
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Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
19
DIVERSITY
MOVING
ON UP
After the the Milburn report
sparked renewed claims of
elitism in law, Charlotte
Edmond assesses the
debate about what firms
can – and should – do to
boost social mobility
It was inevitable that the recent report put
together by former cabinet minister Alan
Milburn would find professions such as
law and medicine dominated by affluent,
privately-educated individuals.
While social mobility has been on
the political agenda for years, the
professions have seen little change,
with the majority of the UK’s lawyers
still coming from a select group of
independently-educated pupils who go on
to attend Russell Group universities.
Nevertheless, recent years have seen
the City’s major law firms wake up to the
need to – or at least to the need to be seen
to – attract talent from a wider pool and
create a more diverse mix of young lawyers
entering the profession.
According to Milburn’s report,
‘Unleashing Aspiration: The Final Report
of the Panel on Fair Access to the
Professions’, of all the professions, doctors
and lawyers are the occupations whose
members typically grew up in the most
wealthy families.
The report, commissioned by
the Government following the New
Opportunities White Paper, led to the
creation of an 18-strong panel at the
start of this year. The group, which was
chaired by Milburn and included Lord
David Neuberger as well as Geoffrey
Vos QC, chairman of The Social Mobility
Foundation, set out to examine the
20 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
barriers and pathways to reaching
professions for all people, regardless of
their background.
The findings were hardly shocking, but
made for stark reading. Lawyers born in
1970 typically grew up in families with
income 64% higher than the average
family, and, the report says, unless the
trends of recent decades are reversed, the
typical doctor or lawyer of the future will
today be growing up in a family that is
better off than five in six of all families in
the UK.
Bearing in mind that the UK average
for independently-schooled people stands
just above 5%, the fact that somewhere in
the region of 75% of the UK’s judges and
over 65% of top barristers were privately
educated paints a depressing picture of
how small the pool of talent feeding the
profession is.
The figures put the Bar ahead of pretty
much any other professional sector in
terms of drawing from the privatelyeducated. About 55% of solicitors,
meanwhile, are independently schooled.
It is, however, worth pointing out that
in a comparison between the 1980s and
2000s, solicitors saw a marked decrease
in independently-schooled individuals
compared with other occupations
reviewed, and the report concludes
that about 70% of solicitors were
independently schooled 20 years ago.
‘The Milburn
view is
slightly
simplistic
in that the
starting
point has to
be getting
education
right in the
first place’
Roger Finbow,
Ashurst
A number of initiatives have sought to
redress this lack of social diversity in the
legal profession. The high-profile Sutton
Trust is one of a number of organisations
dedicated to broadening access,
running its Pathways to Law initiative
in conjunction with the College of Law.
The £1.5m programme is aimed at giving
students from state schools in England a
chance to experience life in a City law firm.
It targets students from under-represented
backgrounds from year 12 onwards and is
only open to pupils who will be the first in
their family to attend university.
Run in association with its five partner
universities – Leeds, the London School
of Economics, Manchester, Southampton
and Warwick – the scheme consists of
university-based training, e-mentoring and
firm placement.
Other programmes
Other programmes focused on opening
up opportunities to sixth-form students
include Pure Potential and Target
Chances. Both schemes aim to change the
aspirations of bright state-school educated
students and run various events and
workshops tutoring them in presentation
and communication skills and putting
together their personal statement and CV,
for example.
Deborah Dalgleish, head of trainee
recruitment at Freshfields Bruckhaus
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DIVERSITY
Deringer, comments: “The legal profession ‘Everyone
still has a long way to go, although
should have
much has been achieved in recent years.
Collectively there are two key messages
an equal
we need to communicate. The first involves
chance and
giving people insight as to what the
options are, what the profession involves
should know
and what skills are needed to succeed.
that this is
“Second, we need to break down the
barriers caused by misconceptions – there the case’
is not a particular type of person that will
Deborah Dalgleish,
get a job in law and a type that won’t.
Freshfields
Patently not everyone can be a lawyer, but Bruckhaus Deringer
provided they have the intelligence and
other key skills needed to function in the
profession, everyone should have an equal
chance and should know this is the case.”
The City Solicitors’ Education Trust
works to similar aims and since 2008
has run a summer school for around 100
university students at a time. Ashurst
consultant Roger Finbow, who has been
heavily involved in the scheme since its
outset, explains: “If your background
is such that you can find out about the
opportunities available or you have
parents who have useful connections or
who are knowledgeable in these things,
then you automatically have a better
start in your career. A lot of what we do is
about giving knowledge and confidence
to those people who don’t have those
opportunities.”
Proactive approach
Allen & Overy (A&O) is one of a number
of firms taking things into its own hands
and this summer launched its Kick Start
programme, designed to offer young
people from non-traditional backgrounds
an insight into the world of business. The
firm opened its doors to over 100 students
aged 16 and 17 who took part in a series
of interactive sessions which the firm
hopes will help them learn skills like how
to improve their personal impact, how to
debate and how to work in a team. These
sessions range from presenting a legal
defence to playing a business game where
students have to negotiate the sale of a
fictional football club.
Jane Masey, HR policy and diversity
manager at A&O, comments: “We have
been involved in various projects both
individually and as a profession for some
time now. It is important to change the
perception of the profession because for all
the help and support you can give young
people, it is not going to make a difference
if they are not considering a career in the
profession.”
However, while the efforts made by
law firms and charities alike are laudable,
it is apparent that the perception of the
profession as closed to a certain category
of people remains deep-rooted.
Many law firms are now making a
conscious effort to widen the number of
universities they tour and recruit from
beyond the traditional Russell Group in an
22 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
attempt to attract a more diverse group.
However, by consensus, such efforts have
so far had a limited impact.
A related issue for law firms is the
amount of data they have on the social
mix of their own staff, which would help
firms shape their policies in this area.
Although the use of diversity quotas is not
widespread, the major firms are certainly
monitoring their diversity levels, and most
employ diversity or inclusion managers. As
large, profitable entities, there is certainly
pressure on firms to be seen ‘giving
something back’.
Working with a broader base of
universities is a good start, but many firms
argue that the problem comes at a younger
age than this, as many of the people they
need to attract would not consider a good
university, less so a career in law.
Coupled with this, firms argue that
there is a limit to how far they can spread
their net regarding universities, which
puts more onus on ‘non-traditional’
applicants to apply to the firms directly.
The problem is, Finbow and others believe,
many of those other candidates have been
conditioned not to apply.
There is also a lingering resentment
from the profession regarding the social
mobility debate, with some criticising
Milburn’s report for retrenching the elitism
perceptions of law. Others argue the
report fails to put enough emphasis on
the ‘supply-side’ issues beyond law firms’
control – meaning short-comings with the
UK’s state educational system.
Finbow comments: “The Milburn view is
slightly simplistic in that the starting point
has to be getting education right in the
first place. No amount of sticking plaster
when students are much older will fix the
problem if they are not correctly educated
in the first place, and there continues to be
such a divide in our state schools.”
While several of the schemes boast
they have led students to gain vacation
placements and even training contracts
at City law firms, the actual numbers
remain small.
Many schemes are still too young to
measure the true impact on social diversity
at the bottom end of the profession.
But with such an innate and limiting
perception of the culture at the modern
law firm, that is not to say that firms
should give up trying – they just should not
expect any quick-fix solutions.
Indeed, many neutral observers
would argue that with the profession
only recently attempting to deal with
these issues, law firms can do a lot more
to tackle social mobility than has been
the case.
Sibyl Zao-Sanders at Pure Potential
summarises: “Compared to a number
of other professions we work with, the
legal profession does have one of the
worst reputations for accessibility. As a
profession, law firms are working very
hard to change the image that there is
more to it than the ‘posh judges in wigs’
stereotype, but there is still a long way
to go.”
PERCENTAGE INDEPENDENTLY SCHOOLED
BY PROFESSION, 1980S AND 2000S
% independently schooled, late 1980s
% independently schooled, early 2000s
Barristers
Solicitors
Politicians
CEOs
Medics
Vicechancellors
Journalists
Judges
0
20
40
60
80
Source: Unleashing Aspiration: The final report of the panel on fair access to the Professions
www.legalweek.com/students
Share the thinking.
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never been
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the experiences of one of our trainees working
on the Lehman Brothers administration, visit
our website www.linklaters.com/ukgrads
PRISON LAW
John Hirst recalls
a markedly different
legal education to
that experienced by
most law students
When I first entered Armley Prison in
Leeds in April 1971, having just received
four years for arson plus two times six
months consecutively for burglary and
deception, I looked out of the cell window
aware that the law stopped outside of the
prison gates.
On a hook behind the cell door hung
a loose-leaf booklet, General Notes for
the Guidance of Convicted Prisoners. A
textbook on prison law, British Prisons,
describes that booklet as “summaries
of those parts of the prison rules and
regulations which the prison authorities
have decided prisoners should know
about… What is more, these rules cannot
be challenged in the outside courts, as
they ‘have no formal legal status in the
sense of falling under the jurisdiction of
the English (and Scottish) legal system’.”
It continues: “Prison rules, then, and the
administration of justice in the prisons are
substantially beyond the law.”
In June 1979 I killed my landlady
with an axe, and in February 1980 I
received a discretionary life sentence
for manslaughter on the grounds of
diminished responsibility at Reading
Crown Court. Two psychiatric reports
recommended that I never be released,
while the third recommended release with
the utmost caution. Moving around the
prison system, I developed a reputation for
being a troublemaker having committed
various acts of violence including hitting
a prison officer with a rock in a sock. In
November 1989 I was transferred from
Albany Prison on the Isle of Wight to the
Special Unit in Hull Prison.
I knew the Governor of Hull Prison, Phil
Wheatley (now director general of the
National Offender Management Service),
when he was deputy governor of Gartree
Prison, where I’d been in 1983. We
entered into a contract.
His terms were “no unwarranted
violence”. My condition was to be allowed
on a programme that was education based
– something that had been previously
forbidden to me.
While I was mulling over whether to
study psychology, sociology or criminology,
Stephen Shaw, then director of the
Prison Reform Trust and now Prisons and
Probation Ombudsman, visited the prison
and we had a chat in my cell. He said that
violence was not the answer because it
could be met with force, and gave me a
24 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
HOW I LEARNT
LAW IN PRISON
copy of Prison Rules: A Working Guide.
I absorbed its content like a sponge.
I then got hold of a copy of Foulkes
Administrative Law. It fell open on page
168, chapter six, ‘Powers and their use’.
The ultra vires doctrine section caught
my attention, where Foulkes referred to
a ‘hierarchy of powers’ and used as an
example section 47 of the Prison Act 1952.
I read the next chapter, headed
‘The misuse of power’, with the same
concentration. I thought that this is what
prison is all about: power and the abuse
of power. Foulkes stated: “There is a need
for public power and its efficient exercise:
there is a need for protection against
abuse of power.”
Justice in prison
After the Strangeways prison riot in April
1990, Lord Chief Justice Woolf and His
Honour Judge Stephen Tumin conducted
an inquiry into the disturbances. Around
this time Woolf visited Hull and was
impressed with the Special Unit, saying
that he believed this was the way forward
– smaller, more manageable units.
The Woolf Report concluded that
there was a lack of justice in prisons and
recommended that inmates be allowed
to air their legitimate grievances. The
request/complaint form was introduced,
and Hull Prison was chosen as one of those
to test the new system. A prisoner can
always find something to complain about.
I submitted up to nine a day!
The governor had up to seven days
to respond in writing. Then, if I was not
satisfied with the reply, I could appeal to
the area manager. If they still tried to fob
me off, I would seek an application by way
My understanding of
prison law
is inside
out; at best,
a lawyer
can only
approach
the subject
from
outside in
of judicial review and go to the High Court.
The prison authorities feared me more
when I used the law than they ever did
when I was violent.
I became the most prolific British
prisoner litigant in modern times. I opened
a prison law advice centre from my cell,
and it was not uncommon to have a queue
of 10 prisoners outside my door before
breakfast.
Before being released from prison in
2004, I started a case to allow prisoners
to vote. It went through the High Court
without success but was successful in the
European Court of Human Rights. The
Committee of Ministers has given the
UK until December 2009 to put in place
concrete measures to allow convicted
prisoners the human right to vote.
Power struggle
I used to be a bad boy, but I’m all right
now. I still challenge abuses of power by
public authorities.
And yet I possess no formal legal
qualifications. It would be nice to have a
piece of paper framed on the wall. Still, it
is track record in the field that is the best
judge. I have taken quite a few barristers’,
QCs’ and judges’ scalps along the way and
they all had pieces of paper.
My understanding of prison law is inside
out; at best, a lawyer can only approach
the subject from outside in. It’s a different
perspective. Having inside information is
a distinct advantage. The law lords know
as much about day-to-day life in prison as
I do about day-to-day life in the Houses
of Parliament tearooms. Sometimes
education is about drawing out from
within and not just pumping knowledge in.
www.legalweek.com/students
From different backgrounds, countries and cultures, we work together.
Together we are Clifford Chance.
www.cliffordchance.com/gradsuk
We have a global commitment to diversity, dignity and inclusiveness.
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For you, as a trainee or a vacation scheme student, it is the culture, the atmosphere
and the people you work alongside that will shape the quality of your experience
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an international law firm built on collaboration, innovation and a relentless commitment to
quality in everything we do.
VAC SCHEMES
Law school training sessions
Having spent the preceding nine months
at law school/university, it’s a safe bet that
most law students’ lists of what they want
out of a vac scheme wouldn’t feature the
words ‘more time at law school/university’.
But that hasn’t stopped Cobbetts from
putting its vac schemers through extra
training sessions with the College of Law.
Cultural experiences
Linklaters underlines its credentials as
an employer of sophisticated people
with a taste for the finer things in life
by whisking off its vac schemers to the
theatre. Meanwhile, Taylor Wessing
takes its summer students to comedy
clubs – a precursor, no doubt, to a
professional life full of laughs.
“Use of our outstanding facilities”
With the “full use of our outstanding
facilities, including the staff restaurant,
swimming pool and state-of-the-art
fitness centre”, those spending the
summer at Clifford Chance can put any
planned weekends away to Center Parcs
on hold.
International travel
For those interested in long-haul
destinations, try Allen & Overy, which this
year gave some of its vac schemers the
opportunity to do stints in its New York,
Hong Kong and Dubai offices. Just fancy a
nice day out? Well, Freshfields and Ashurst
could be for you – both of which put on
day trips to the Continent for prospective
recruits.
Ego massage
Vac schemers are, naturally, central to
most firms’ day-to-day operations, as
one former SJ Berwin summer student
attests on the firm’s website: “Partners,
associates, trainees and secretaries all
took time out of their work to explain their
roles. It didn’t go unnoticed that my name
had been put on the door of my office and
on the telephone screen!”
PERKS
OF THE
JOB
Alex Aldridge takes a look at the
bait that law firms are using to hook
potential recruits
Sport
From the fast-paced but ultimately
repetitive (go-karting, Addleshaw
Goddard), to the safely androgynous
(softball, Berwin Leighton Paisner), to the
unashamedly public school but with an
inclusive flavour (touch rugby, Ashurst)...
just read between the lines to extract
the not-so-subtle message about a firm’s
culture and take your pick accordingly.
Fine dining
Admittedly the fineness of the dining
experience varies, but there’s plenty to
choose from. For lovers of themed culinary
extravaganzas, Norton Rose’s vac scheme,
with its accompanying medieval banquet,
is a natural choice. Bird and Bird’s summer
scheme, which features a firm barbecue,
is the standout option for aficionados of
rustic cuisine.
Glastonbury trip
followed by Christmas
Day reunion gettogether
Okay, it hasn’t happened
yet, but as firms continue to
up the ante in their bids to
ingratiate themselves with
the best talent, surely it’s
only a matter of time...
Treasure hunts
Popular among the 3-11 age group and –
for some reason – vac schemers, treasure
hunts are offered by several firms as part
of their summer programmes, including
SJ Berwin and Wragge & Co (around
the centres of London and Birmingham
respectively).
26 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
www.legalweek.com/students
G R E AT M I N D S T H I N K D I F F E R E N T LY
Slaughter and May is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law
So what are we looking for in prospective trainees?
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If you want to know more about training
contracts and work experience schemes, go to:
slaughterandmay.com or contact
The Trainee Recruitment Team
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One Bunhill Row
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VAC SCHEMES
THOSE DRINKS ARE
FREE, YOU KNOW . . .
It’s easy to see vacation schemes as a bit
of a jolly. A few weeks of being wined and
dined, meeting lots of new people, and
generally taking the positives from life in a
law firm without really having to do any of
the hard grind. But for those who are wise
enough, they can and should be much
more than that.
If you’re embarking on a vac scheme this
year, allow me a moment to impart a few
words of (questionable) wisdom. First, if
you’re really interested in finding out what
it’s like, human resources aren’t going to
tell you. The trainees that they wheel out
at drinks events probably won’t tell you
either, unless they’ve had a few too many.
Partners certainly won’t tell you – in fact,
many partners don’t have their eyes open
enough to have a clue what it’s like for
their juniors anyway.
No, if you really want to know what it’s
like, then look beyond the marketing to
the real people around you, particularly
the trainees and junior associates away
from the HR glare. Do they look happy in
their jobs? A bit tired? Utterly drained?
Ex-Magic
Circle
trainee
Dominic
Webb
explains
how to
make the
most of a
vacation
scheme
Unbearably stressed? Or maybe they’re
bored?
And what are the trainees actually
doing with their time? After all, that’ll be
you. They might tell you how important
they feel managing part of a big deal
themselves, but does that actually involve
sitting in a room sorting through dozens of
folders from morning til night?
There is a huge amount to be gained
from going on a vac scheme. Naturally,
many vac schemers will see it as a chance
to impress a prospective employer,
particularly given the current market, and
this is undoubtedly true. But it is also an
unparalleled opportunity to see if the firm,
and indeed the law, is really for you.
With hindsight, I got a bit carried away
with the glamour during my vac scheme.
The barrage of socialising and free drinks,
the facilities, the big money deals, the
London living – it was all pretty exciting for
a student not used to any of those things.
Looking back, the supervisor I sat with
was overworked and miserable. Somehow
I didn’t seem to notice at the time.
Not that noticing would have changed
my decision to apply. But for those less
sure of what they want, or with other
options, it’s a lesson worth heeding. Keep
an open mind and those eyes peeled.
Another thing you might not be aware
of is that departments within the same
firm, particularly at the big firms, can
vary enormously. The differences in ethos
can be like being in entirely different
organisations. Indeed, your experience in
real estate is unlikely to square with what
others are seeing in a big transactional
department. So talk not only to the people
in your department, but to your fellow vac
schemers.
And above all, it’s worth remembering
that a lot of law firms are going through
some real turmoil at the moment.
People are worried about their jobs and
colleagues have been laid off, while loads
of people have virtually nothing to do. In
short, now is a pretty unusual time to be
visiting a law firm. Perhaps ask the lawyers
not just what it’s like to work there at the
moment, but what it was like in the years
of plenty. Hopefully, by the time today’s
vac schemers are starting their training
contracts, the good – if hard-working
– times will be back.
Lastly, despite all of what I’ve said, do
remember to try to have some fun. Making
the most of your vac scheme should not
and does not prevent that. Those drinks
are free, you know...
Dominic Webb (name changed) is a solicitor at a
private client firm.
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28 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
www.legalweek.com/students
! ! ! " # !! $ " " ! !!
Former City solicitor
Dominic Webb on why
corporate law wasn’t for him
A GREAT
ESCAPE
I took a lot from my training with a magic
circle firm. I made a lot of close friends, left
on good terms with my colleagues, and for
those who are wondering, was made an
offer to qualify there. In short, I have no
axe to grind.
Nevertheless, during my time in the City
I noticed many things about the culture
of the big law firms that I perceived to
be negative, particularly from the point
of view of an employee. Those things
ultimately resulted in my leaving corporate
law for good.
It seems that a lawyer in the big firms
has virtually no escape. It’s not just that
any given evening or weekend might be
ruined, but that the important ones might
be ruined. Even in the run up to holidays
you face the possibility that your holiday
might be cancelled (in truth this happens
pretty rarely, but the fact that it happens
at all is enough to make you aware of the
threat). Everyone expects to work long
hours when they join a big firm, but the
24/7 all-encompassing nature of City law
firm life is difficult to properly appreciate
– until you actually live through it.
30 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
I knew an associate who had a young
family – a wife and a child just one month
old. A nice guy, he was clearly a committed
family man. He was extremely efficient
at his work so that he could leave the
office in good time to support his wife and
newborn baby. After all, they both needed
him around. Surely his employer should
bear this in mind?
You can probably guess where the
story goes from here. The partners in his
department (he was not a transactional
lawyer) put him on their element of an
enormous transaction – big even by
magic circle standards. It was clear from
the outset that everybody on it would be
working crazy hours, and so it proved. He
spent a whole month – the second month
of his child’s life – working until late every
evening and both days at the weekend.
He barely saw his wife or his baby for that
whole time.
I thought this was plain wrong. What
planet were the partners on? How could
they give so little thought to the welfare of
a liked and respected employee, and those
who depended on him? It is one thing to
Everyone
expects to
work long
hours when
they join a
big firm, but
the 24/7 allencompassing
nature of City
law firm life
is difficult
to properly
appreciate
– until you
actually live
through it
ask someone to work very hard, but this
was something else.
I concluded that I didn’t want to live like
that. Among my intake, I was far
from alone.
So, to what extent is it justifiable for
law firms to expect their employees to
put work above everything else in their
lives, no matter how unreasonable the
demands? The experience of that associate
would almost certainly not occur in the
‘real world’. Does the very good money
that City lawyers are paid really give
employers carte blanche to demand
whatever they want from them?
Perhaps, you might say, the answer is
simple. If you can’t stand the heat, get out
of the kitchen.
Fine, so be it. But in return I’ll show
you loads of good, young, highly-trained
lawyers just waiting for an economic
upturn so that they can get ‘out of
the kitchen’ themselves. For those big
firms, that has to be a problem worth
addressing.
Dominic Webb (name changed) is a solicitor at a
private client firm.
www.legalweek.com/students
LIFE AS A LAWYER
DESPERATE
TO GET IN
Advertising was okay, says
Alice Evelegh, but my
dream is to be a lawyer
After five years working in advertising I
was in need of a change. Holed up in a
cosy cocktail bar with a few friends, I was
indulging in a good moan about how fed
up I was. I was bored to tears. Compared
with the work stories my friends from
university could tell, anything I added
sounded trite, facile and empty. They
kindly tried to cheer me up by reminding
me that usually I loved advertising.
“After all,” someone said, “at least
you get to work in a fun industry. Imagine
being stuck somewhere boring like a law
firm!” However, I didn’t laugh. I knew
plenty of lawyers, and they weren’t boring
at all. Hmm. I was abstracted for the rest
of the evening, thinking about a career
in law...
Working in an ad agency is, let me be
clear, great fun at times. The people are all
lovely – friendly, witty and dedicated. Very
few working environments have so many
employees with such strong people skills.
After all, account management is all about
providing superb service to clients and
developing great relationships with media
contacts.
It’s also about getting a huge thrill
out of working at high speed, with the
satisfaction of knowing that the end result
is flawless, the client delighted and a good
deal has been struck with the media. The
work-hard ethos is balanced by an equal
amount of play-hard. Clients had to be
entertained, taken out to dinner and taken
dancing until they dropped.
So, why was I complaining? Well, sorry
to sound mercenary, but the financial
rewards were not so great. And advertising
demanded long hours. One client was so
www.legalweek.com/students
busy on Fridays that I gave up making any
social arrangements for that day, being
frequently in the office until 10pm or so
– although I imagine that doesn’t sound so
tough to corporate lawyers.
In truth, I didn’t begrudge the time
spent – it was more important to me that
the work was done well. But my salary
was really, really low. Apologies for being
coy as to the actual amount, but trust me,
retail assistants in Top Shop probably took
home more than me. And they get a lovely
fat discount in-store, too.
Lack of challenge
Also, with the recession, things changed.
The amount of work I was doing each
day lightened as clients slashed budgets,
which at first I didn’t mind as it meant
more time to spend on each campaign.
Unfortunately, the extra time revealed
one thing fairly rapidly to me: without the
buzz of turning around huge numbers
of adverts in a short space of time,
without the thrill of maintaining accuracy
under huge pressures, advertising didn’t
interest me.
I didn’t care that much about finding the
perfect solution to a campaign. Digging
right into the nitty-gritty of circulation
figures and readership analysis bored me
rigid. Also, I was horrified to find that I had
begun to consider my work trivial. Hours
of painstaking effort made for adverts
that might be glanced at once and then
chucked in the bin by the reader. Could I
really see myself continuing to work in an
industry I didn’t care about?
The next day I had a look at some legal
websites. I read some articles, and found
Reading
the paper,
every story
seemed
to have a
legal angle.
Everywhere
I looked
I saw the
impact that
the law had
some online forums to chat to people in.
I contacted my friends who were already
in practice, and questioned them in
painstaking detail about their lives, their
careers and how the industry functioned.
And I found myself rapidly hooked.
Reading the paper, every story seemed
to have a legal angle – everywhere I
looked I saw the impact that the law had.
Here was an industry with some serious
substance to tangle with. Perhaps life in a
law firm would be less playful. But it would
also be less frivolous. It certainly didn’t
sound as though it would be boring.
Engaging work
It would be an opportunity to learn new
things every day, to continually develop
and engage with a far more substantial
world where my decisions would make so
much more of an impact. An opportunity
to enjoy the valuable privilege of using my
brain each day.
In short, I would dig my teeth into one
of the most serious industries I could think
of. I was aware that it would be tough, but
I had a pretty good brain, which I hoped
would be up to the challenge. In fact, I was
raring to go – I hadn’t been so excited in
years.
Six months later, and my life has
changed significantly. I have started the
first term of my CPE/GDL, and am certain
I have made a great decision. The course
is fascinating, the people are lovely and
certainly aren’t boring in any way. Believe
it or not, I’ve found that even lawyers like
to have fun.
Alice Evelegh is a GDL student at the University of
the West of England.
Legal Week Autumn 2009
31
INSIDE TIPS
CITY SURVIVAL GUIDE
By Anonymous Assistant (anonymousassistant.com)
Institute of Legal Executives
Your best route to a
career as a lawyer
“There are many
benefits to becoming a
lawyer through ILEX, and
the gaps between being
a solicitor, barrister or
legal executive lawyer
are diminishing:
I can now become an
advocate*, a judge or a
partner.”
ILEX offers a highly cost-effective and accessible route to becoming a lawyer. Entry is
accessible for those holding a variety of qualifications, including law degrees.
The ILEX route to law is also ideal for ambitious legal secretaries and paralegals, or
those who haven’t got a training contract or pupillage.
Benefits of the ILEX route
ILEX offers an achievable, affordable and flexible route to becoming a qualified lawyer:
� Study, exam and registration fees cost from around £5,500 spread over the four
years’ of part-time study (the typical time taken to study all the ILEX academic
qualifications). If you are eligible for exemptions then your study time may be
shorter.
� Combining study with full-time work can enable those studying to be Legal
Executive lawyers to earn in the region of £63,000 over the typical four-year study
period.
� You don’t need to get a training contract or pupillage, and ILEX Fellows who wish
to go on to qualify as solicitors are usually exempt from the SRA’s 2-year training
contract.
� A new Graduate Fat-Track Diploma is available for those with a qualifying law
degree, with study fees of only around £1700.
� If you hold the Legal Practice Course (LPC) or the Bar Vocational Course (BVC) you
do not have to take the ILEX qualifications, and can immediately apply to become
a Member of ILEX. With five years’ of relevant work experience, you can apply to
become a Legal Executive lawyer.
� Fully qualified Legal Executive lawyers can then expect to earn around £35,000£55,000 on average across England and Wales, and salaries can be much higher
depending on your talent and ambition.
DON’T
DO
Be fooled by the generous
salary. On an hour-for-hour basis
you’d earn more stacking shelves in
a supermarket.
Remember that hard work
never killed anyone. Well, not
initially, at least…
Be deceived by the ‘perks’
of the job. Having a laptop and
remote access only means you will
never escape.
Be thankful they don’t extend
further. At least the firm hasn’t
marketed electronic tagging as an
“employment benefit” yet.
Expect a social life. 99% of outof-work plans will be scuppered by
an ‘URGENT’ piece of work, which,
‘YOU MUST ACTION IMMEDIATELY!’
Toil all evening/weekend to
complete it on time, so it can sit
in your boss’ in-tray for a month.
Get ideas above your station.
You might be in charge of multimillion pound deals but that doesn’t
mean you’ll get your filing done
when you want it.
Remember your place. ‘Assistant’
ranks slightly above ‘trainee’ but
well below ‘secretary’ in the office
hierarchy.
Exceed your target hours.
They’ll just think they’re too easy
and increase them again.
Try to understand the bonus
system. Percentages, performance
markers, target formulae, and extra
points for brown-nosing – MI5
would be hard pushed to crack it.
� You can represent your clients in court if you study to be a Legal Executive
Advocate.
� ILEX Fellows are now eligible to apply for judicial appointment and to become
partners in legal disciplinary firms.
� You don’t need to get a training contract or pupillage, and ILEX Fellows who wish
to go on to qualify as solicitors are usually exempt from the SRA’s 2-year training
contract.
� Whilst your are still studying, your employer (on a court assessment of costs) can
charge out your fee-earning time on either the level D litigation assistant fee
scale, which is currently up to £136 an hour or the level C fee scale of up to £222
an hour (based on SCCO 2009 guidelines for London).
To date, over 80,000 people have chosen ILEX as their route to be a lawyer.
Why not join them?
Expect to attend any
prestigious corporate events.
You won’t get a sniff of Ascot
unless there’s an outbreak of Ebola
amongst the partnership.
www.ilexcareers.org.uk
32 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
Assume you won’t receive one.
There is bound to be a disqualifying
factor (behaviour at the office party,
above average consumption of
biscuits, propensity for pink ties…)
which rules you out.
Be grateful for small mercies.
A day out with 15 boozed-up clients
makes an appearance on the Jeremy
Kyle show seem appealing.
Waste your time being diligent
and hard working. It won’t get
you promoted.
What all successful lawyers do:
cheat! Lie about your abilities and
take credit for other peoples’ ideas.
You’ll be eating at the partners’
table before you know it.
Lose sight of why you became
a lawyer: to champion justice and
challenge your intellect.
Remember that there are worse
options out there. Never mind
your awful boss and how many
hours your work, being a lawyer is
better than cleaning toilets.
Join us now
Contact 01234 841000 or email [email protected]
Form an assistants’ union and
collectively under-perform.
Well, it’s a gamble, but it works in
the civil service.
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SQUEEZE MORE INTO TWO YEARS
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CONVERSION COURSE
TEN STEPS
TO GDL
SUCCESS
Katie Scuoler asks veterans of the
Graduate Diploma in Law for their tips
on how to survive the course
The Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL) offers
an avenue into the legal profession for
non-law graduates. Sometimes referred
to by its historical title of the Common
Professional Exam (CPE), the GDL can
be studied either as a one-year full-time
course or a two-year part-time course. The
GDL is an intensive foundation covering
seven core areas of law, and with the
addition of legal theory and skills modules,
there is no escaping the fact that the
GDL is a tough year. With the Central
Application Board stating that students
should allow 45 hours a week for lectures,
tutorials, private study and research, the
work load can come as shock to some
students.
Try taking on these tips compiled from
the experiences of GDL veterans on how
best to negotiate the course:
1. Keep up with the workload
The GDL moves at a fast pace, so you need
to keep on top of your subjects. The course
operates on a tight schedule, making it
34 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
difficult to find the time to regain any lost
ground at a later date. The GDL is not a
course in which you can coast throughout
the year and hope to pull it together in
time for the final exams. Most institutions
allow very limited time for revision before
the onslaught of final exams begins. This
means that come exam time you need to
have done the groundwork because there
is no time to return to basics. Essentially,
do the work when it is set, don’t let it pile
up and don’t get left behind.
2. Pace yourself
Keep up with the workload, but pace
yourself. You will repeatedly hear that
the GDL is a marathon and not a sprint.
Keep the momentum up throughout the
year but at the same time don’t burn out.
When studying law from scratch, you could
spend an infinite amount of time on any
one topic. A better strategy is to allocate
a fixed amount of time to your tutorial
preparation (for example, four hours)
and then not exceed this. This way you’ll
get through the work and will be able to
balance the course with a social life.
3. Answer the problem questions
in preparation for tutorials
Don’t spend so long reading through
your notes or textbook that you run out
of time to address the problems set.
While you need to know the law, you
also have to be able to apply the law to a
fact pattern. Most of the GDL is assessed
using problem scenarios, and invariably
assessments follow a similar format to
tutorial problems. There are knacks to
answering problem questions that differ
between subjects. By specifically focusing
preparation and revision time on the
problem questions set, you shouldn’t get
caught out come final exams.
4. Become a master of
organisation
This extends to all aspects of your life.
Set aside time in your schedule to do the
work for each subject and stick to it. This
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CONVERSION COURSE
will prevent you from dragging out the
preparation for one subject to the detriment
of another. Many students treat the GDL
as a nine to five job, allowing them their
evenings of freedom. Allocate time in your
timetable for training contract applications
and pro bono activities because otherwise
it is easy for such things to fall by the
wayside. Keep your files in order, use
highlighters, tabs, dividers, put away your
notes and buy a diary. Make it as easy for
yourself as you can.
5. Get the basics right
At the beginning of the course it is
especially easy to become bogged down in
the subtleties and nuances of smaller cases.
Don’t lose sight of the bigger picture. When
looking at a topic, identify the key cases and
statutes followed by the main exceptions
or anomalies. And then really nail these. It
is far easier to slot in the higher level marks
when you have the basics in place. This is
especially true in criminal law and trusts
and equity, where students often make
fundamental errors on the basics principles
of law. There are always marks for stating
the basics correctly.
6. Consolidate, consolidate,
consolidate
This can be tricky in the early days when
you’re not accustomed to studying law, but
consolidating your notes will pay dividends
come exam time and provides you with
good building blocks for the rest of the
course. Find a method that works for you.
Family tree-type diagrams are particularly
useful, setting out the legal structure with
supporting case law. This way you can
trace the answer to a problem question
through. For other people, stripping each
topic down to an A4 page works well.
Also, try to do any consolidation exercises
available to you (or at least do them at
revision time).
7. Make friends with your statute
books from the outset
Particularly in European Community
law and contract law, much of what
you need to know is laid out for you in
your statute book. With some strategic
underlining, highlighting and tabbing you
will have the answer in front of you come
exam time. (Remembering, of course, to
adhere to any rules governing statute
book annotation.)
8. Don’t get disheartened
If at the beginning your grades aren’t as
you would have hoped, don’t despair. For
most people the GDL is fundamentally
different to their first degrees. There is a
skill to writing ‘legal speak’ and this takes
some time to grasp.
Legal writing can prove particularly alien
to arts graduates who have spent three
years cultivating a wonderfully elaborate
turn of phrase.
36 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
9. Ignore the clever clogs
There will always be someone who can
rattle off the name of all the cases, the
dissenting judge in this, that and the
other and frankly, make you feel stupid.
Don’t be perturbed by such individuals.
The key to success on the GDL is
understanding the significance and
applicability of each case. Make sure
you know how to use what you know
correctly. Pinpoint what it was about
a case that led to it being decided a
particular way: was it something particular
about the facts of the case? A policy
decision? Has it since been overruled?
What did this judge say that differed from
that judge? Then apply the case precisely
to the problem scenario you have.
10. Pay attention at the
beginning of the course
The information contained in modules
such as ‘English legal lethod’ is central to
understanding the English legal system.
Don’t dismiss these introductory lectures.
A solid understanding of the court
structure and the appeal route
There will
always be
someone
who can
rattle off
the name
of all the
cases, the
dissenting
judge in
this, that
and the
other and
frankly,
make you
feel stupid
is a big advantage, particularly in the
trusts and equity and criminal courses.
Also, pay attention in any introductory
research method sessions – this
knowledge is invaluable when it comes to
doing your individual assignment later in
the course.
11. Focus on doing training
contract applications in the
first term
If you’re looking for a training contract,
focus on doing so in the first term. At
most institutions the assessments and
work pile up in the second term, so if
you’re applying for training contracts try
to do as many of your applications as
possible early on.
12. Give in to the geekiness
However much you think you will not turn
into a ‘legal eagle’, or ‘law bore’, you will.
So when you find yourself chuckling at R
v Collins [1972] or praising Lord Denning’s
poetic exposition in Miller v Jackson
[1977], drop the facade and surrender to
your inner geek.
www.legalweek.com/students
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Let’s talk law
STUDENT
AUTUMN 2009
BAR SPECIAL
IS A CAREER IN CRIME STILL A VIABLE OPTION?
PLUS: MONEY TALKS – THE LATEST ON THE COMMERCIAL
BAR SALARY WARS… AND MUCH MORE
THE CRIMINAL BAR
CRIME DOESN’T
Don’t go to the criminal Bar. I can’t put it
strongly enough. Don’t do it.
It is a mug’s game. Let me try to explain.
First, pupillage awards are scandalously
low – usually now £10,000 per year and
often your own earnings in your second six
months count as part of that.
Furthermore, you will often have
worked hard for a hearing, but then see it
discontinued through no fault of your own.
That’s because, quite regularly:
l The client fails to attend, which means
you’re paid a basic appearance fee, usually
after being abused by the bench as if it’s
your fault, being asked to make various
fatuous excuses by the solicitors, and
waiting at court for some hours.
l The client does not arrive from prison.
You’re paid a basic appearance fee, usually
after waiting at court for some hours.
l The Probation Service/Crown
Prosecution Service (CPS)/court lacks their
file, or the relevant parts of it.
If you do have an effective hearing,
each or a combination of the above can
delay it from happening for many hours.
The result is often that, through no fault
of your own, you cannot make a second
It may
sound like
fun – but
you will
struggle
to make
ends meet,
says former
criminal
barrister
Alex
Deane
case that chambers have booked you in
for later that day. You will be “in trouble”,
although you’ve done nothing wrong, and
moreover you miss out on the possibility
of perhaps getting a bit of money on that
second case (which you’ve often worked
on in preparation).
l The hearing has been vacated
administratively by the court but the
message has not reached your solicitors, or
the solicitors have not passed the
message on to chambers, or
it has been passed on
to chambers
Working for free
Worse still, you will often find yourself
working for free. That’s because you will
find quite regularly:
l Solicitors will have double booked
counsel. In which case you’re paid
nothing.
l The client has double
booked solicitors. If
the client goes
with the other
firm at the
hearing, you’re
paid nothing.
l The solicitors have
decided to cover the
matter in-house but have
not told your clerks, or your
clerks have not bothered to
check. You’re paid nothing.
We believe in letting our graduates have the freedom
they need to make the most of their careers. The fact
that every single qualifying trainee has been offered
a position this year proves that our unique approach
is the right one. Our trainees take on responsibility
from day one and enjoy varied and challenging work
for industry-shaping clients. If you become a trainee
with us, you will be given the
chance to excel.
www.twobirds.com/graduates
where do you want to be?
40 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
www.legalweek.com/students
PAY
The Criminal Bar is not a
proper job. It’s a hobby,
and a pleasant one for
those with a separate
income – but you cannot
make a living from it in
the first four or five years
3-4 SOUTH SQUARE
Application Details
For further details please see the pupillage page on our
website.
Tenants: 44
Junior tenancies offered in last 3 years: 3
Pupillage Details
Pupillage details
Up to four, 12 month, £42,500 but subject to review grant, apply by
29 January 2010.
Up to four twelve month pupillages are available, currently
funded at £42,500 each but subject to review. Pupillages are
reviewable after the first six months + a proportion of the
pupillage award may be paid during a BVC year for living expenses
Chambers specialisation codes: DE10
Type of work undertaken
3-4 South Square has a pre-eminent reputation in insolvency and restructuring law
and specialist expertise in banking, financial services, company law, professional
negligence, domestic and international arbitration, mediation, European Union
Law, insurance/reinsurance law and general commercial litigation. Recent cases
include BCCI, Maxwell Communications Corporation, Lloyd’s of London, Barings,
Enron, Railtrack, Marconi, Northern Rock, Kaupthing and Lehman Brothers.
Our work requires a high degree of self-discipline and self-motivation. The ability to
work as part of a team of barristers, solicitors and other professionals is also vital.
We are seeking to recruit the highest calibre of candidates who must be prepared
to commit themselves to establishing a successful practice and maintaining
Chambers’ position at the forefront of the modern commercial Bar.
Pupils are welcomed into all areas of Chambers’ life and are provided with an
organised programme designed to train and equip them for practice in a dynamic
and challenging environment. They sit with a number of pupil supervisors. In
recent years a high proportion of our pupils have been offered tenancies, and it is
the policy of Chambers to assist new tenants to establish careers in the early
stages of their practice.
If you have a good 2:1 degree or higher, whether in law or any other subject and
would like to apply for a pupillage, send your CV to the Pupillage Secretary,
together with a covering letter. The closing dates for applications for October
2011 is 29 January 2010.
Assessed Mini-Pupils
Chambers offer up to 10 assessed mini-pupillages, each carrying an award of
£500. These assessed mini-pupillages will be one week in duration and structured
so that assessed mini-pupils will spend time with a variety of members of
Chambers, mainly at the pupil-supervisor level, and will experience Chambers’
life as fully as possible. Please see our website for further details.
Those interested in applying for a 12-month pupillage are strongly encouraged to
apply for a mini-pupillage in the previous year.
Unfunded Mini-Pupils
Unfunded mini-pupillages of two days’ duration are offered. Please see our
website for further details. Application should be made to the Pupillage
Secretary by CV and covering letter.
3-4 South Square, Gray’s Inn, London WC1R 5HP
Tel: 020 7696 9900 Fax: 020 7696 9911 Email: [email protected] Website: www.southsquare.com
www.legalweek.com/students
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
41
THE CRIMINAL BAR
but your clerks have not put it on the brief.
You’re paid nothing.
l Fees will often go unpaid for years,
sometimes finally begrudgingly paid
without interest, or are never paid at all.
l In some of these situations, there are
plausible, possible recourses to try to
get you some payment. However, your
chambers won’t be interested in taking
them up on your behalf as the work
coming in from the firm for more senior
members is more important than the work
you do – and relationships with the firm
are too valuable in the current climate of
fear about where fees are coming from.
Unpleasant
Chambers is also often an unpleasant
experience because:
l Chambers will often be struggling to find
work for more senior members so there
will be very little (or no) “trickle-down” of
better briefs (for example, Crown Court
work) – whereas once you could gradually
get better work, often in your first few
years. The very worst briefs that you start
off on remain the sort of work you do for
some time.
l Even if you do manage to impress
solicitors and they send in work for you,
your name will often be Tipp-exed out and
the name of a tenant put in its place.
l Chambers will send you out for an
improper fee. The Bar Council issued a
warning note to chambers last year that
stated that junior members of the Bar
were being used for very low fees as “loss-
42 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
leaders” (where a hearing is carried out
even though it will be at a financial loss,
because it will lead to more work from
that solicitor).
l If a “squatter” (someone who has
completed the formal requirements of the
12-month pupillage but is not a tenant
in chambers, rather having a further trial
period) you will be asked to do work for
other members of chambers. Unlike in
other kinds of law, and unlike in criminal
sets in the past, you will almost certainly
not be paid for it. You can expect this
regularly and you will not be treated any
better as a result.
The lifestyle you will lead is unpleasant
more generally because:
l The payment of travel and waiting is now
not automatic and you will often not actually
be paid for it – regularly winding up out of
pocket even on magistrates’ court cases.
l You will be treated badly by many
courts, where ushers, clerks and benches
are more used to their local solicitors and
resent counsel that seem like outsiders.
l You will be treated like the enemy in
courts that have removed the defence
advocates’ room, usually giving it over to
the Probation Service or the CPS.
l Once you have done the preliminary
work on a case, even if the lay client wants
to retain you, it will often be taken from
you – to be done at trial / more serious
stages by a more senior member of
chambers or by the firm who may take it
back in-house. They’re not supposed to do
so but, again, the firm is too important to
chambers so nobody complains.
A hobby
‘You still earn
a fair whack
more than the
average wage,
you are your
own boss, with
an interesting,
varied and
responsible job
that is actually
useful’
Simon Myerson
QC responds on
page 44
Don’t go to the criminal Bar. It’s not a
proper job. It’s a hobby, and a pleasant
one for those with an independent income
– but you simply cannot make a living from
it in the first four or five years.
Worse still, the future is even bleaker, with
the CPS taking in more and more in-house
advocates to prosecute on one side and
save money, and solicitors taking in more
and more higher rights advocates to defend
and capitalise on fees on the other side. The
independent Bar gets squeezed in the middle,
accepting less and less in fees for more and
more work because that’s all that’s available.
It’s undignified and demeaning and you
don’t want any part of it. Fees are actually
getting lower each year as the Dutch
auction between chambers worsens. A
regular appearance in the magistrates’
court could once be guaranteed to average
out at £100 – now it’s more like £60.
I can attest from personal experience
– and the experience of many people I
know – that many barristers who have
been in practice for two or three years will
regularly only receive £100 a week.
Once you factor in tax and expenses, it’s
not just a joke that you’d be better off on
benefits – it’s genuinely true.
Alex Deane practised as a criminal barrister from
2005 to 2009. He now works for a think tank
and holds a door tenancy at a set where “none of
this abuse of junior tenants takes place, but the
financial challenges still remain”.
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Every law firm has
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From there, how high you go is entirely up to you.
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THE CRIMINAL BAR
In order to see whether there is anything
in the preceding litany of gloom and doom
(see pages 40-42), I have tried to analyse
the actual complaints.
It seems to me that there are three. First,
that our author did not get a fair run at his
work. Second, that as a result of this he
made very little money. Third, that he did not
like the way he was treated by a number of
people. But he proceeds on the assumption
that it is like this for the entire criminal Bar
– or a substantial proportion of it. I do not
believe that this assumption is correct.
The figures first of all: Googling the term
‘barristers’ earnings’ produces statistics
from the Bar Council showing that for
criminal work barristers earn between
£10,000-£30,000 in their first year and
£40,000-£90,000 in their fifth year. Of
course that depends on you, your talent,
ability and luck. But even for the almost
terminally unfortunate pupil of 25, it would
only mean that you wouldn’t earn proper
money until you were 30 – not really the
stuff of despair. That earnings are not what
they once were is simultaneously true. But
you still earn a fair whack more than the
average wage, you are your own boss,
with an interesting, varied and responsible
job that is actually useful.
Second, the clues: the article contains
a litany of complaints about barristers’
chambers. But these are, necessarily,
specific rather than generic. To take an
example: client choice is important. If the
client decides he wants a different solicitor
it is the job of the clerk or chambers to
ensure that the barrister does not work for
solicitors who do not actually have a client.
The state does not run a compensation
service for those who work hard but are
then told they are not wanted. The author
was a tenant: his chambers could – and
should – have taken a robust approach to
such behaviour by solicitors.
Similarly, no set of chambers should be
sending their junior tenants to work for
peanuts as a loss leader. The good ones don’t
and the circuit sets don’t. But that complaint
is not about the Bar – it is about the set and
how it is run. On the subject of ushers, clerks
and benches resenting outsiders, it’s true
that magistrates can certainly be touchy, but
I have not encountered touchiness based on
being an outsider.
I have also been in courts on every
circuit in the country, in every major town
and quite a few minor ones. I have been
doing the job for 23 years, and I have
never, ever, found the ushers anything
other than helpful and polite.
Sense of satisfaction
What could have been said? Well, I can’t
myself contemplate writing even the most
negative piece without mentioning the
sense of satisfaction I get from assisting
people who would be outrageously
disadvantaged if required to articulate
their own case for themselves.
44 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
Simon Myerson QC responds to Alex Deane’s criticisms, arguing
that the criminal Bar is still a career worth pursuing
THE CASE FOR
THE DEFENCE
This is a
competitive
world.
No client
deserves
less than the
best they
can have.
The onus is
on you to
show that
you’re the
best person
That is the essence of criminal practice
at the Bar – the levelling of the playing
field so that everyone has proper
representation. That is worthwhile and it
is deeply satisfying, even when politicians
are calling you a parasite. I can, I have
and I do put up with a lot of rubbish for
that. The financial rewards can be great,
but providing I make a living they are
secondary to a sense of vocation, a pride
in the profession and job satisfaction (in
my opinion, in that order).
What should not have been said? The
article strikes me as being complaining and
demanding.
Complaining: it sticks in the craw that
a barrister considers it demeaning to
compete for work. This is a competitive
world. No client deserves less than the
best they can have. The onus is on you to
demonstrate that the best person is you
– and, yes, it is difficult and the dice are
loaded. Notwithstanding which, if you find
it beneath you then you shouldn’t be doing
the job. The world doesn’t owe you a living.
Many, many good young barristers make
a go of doing criminal work because they
enjoy it, are excited by it and are good at it.
Demanding: the moan about pupillage
awards is from the wrong end of the
telescope.
Pupillage awards are a sum of money
paid to people who are not yet able to
do the job. The money comes from the
earnings of the barristers in chambers.
They are being trained by someone who
will give them their all and receive not a
penny for doing so. If the pupil is diligent,
they may after eight or nine months save
their supervisor about an hour by doing
a standard piece of work pretty well.
Until then they cost hours of time. That
time is given happily, because the pupils
themselves are usually delightful company,
eager and willing to work hard and learn,
and because supervisors are committed to
the profession and to the pupils.
Misguided criticism
To complain that you aren’t paid enough
in those circumstances is misjudged. The
aim of the award is to ensure that a pupil
can pay their rent, travel and eat without
too much worry. It is to make up for you
not having a private income, not to give
you one.
I certainly believe that what has been
done to payment for criminal cases is
indefensible. The Bar accepted the need to
reduce the amount of money the country
spent on criminal legal aid and cooperated
fully with Lord Carter in his review,
redistributing the money in the budget
from the more senior to the more junior.
That the government then tried to
impose a costs scheme for larger cases
– which was nothing to do with those
proposals – was unpleasant.
The cynicism with which it now asserts
that costs should be reduced a further
23% to reflect Crown Prosecution
Service (CPS) fees, when it had previously
acknowledged that CPS fees unjustifiably
lagged behind defence fees, is quite
breathtaking. But that does not outweigh
the simple fact that being at the Bar is a
remarkable privilege.
Don’t come to this job because you want
to earn a shedload of money (although you
may). Come because you want to make
law and apply law so that everyone in this
country (accused or victim, rich or poor)
has someone to articulate what they want
to say at the time when they most need to
say it. There isn’t much you can do which is
more important than that.
Simon Myerson is a barrister at St Paul’s Chambers
and author of the blog ‘Pupillage and How to Get It’
pupillageandhowtogetit.blogspot.com
www.legalweek.com/students
Exception is the rule
TLT LLP is part of a new wave of law firms.We’re a top-100 firm, with some 650 people across
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We’re one of just ten top-100 law firms to offer a full flexible benefits plan. This gives you the
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If you want to grow and flourish with a firm that’s going places,
visit www.TLTcareers.com/trainee
NEWS
FOUR NEW SQUARE INCREASES PUPILLAGE
AWARD BY 33% AS RIVALS ALSO BOOST PAY
[email protected]
Four New Square is to increase its
pupillage award by 33%, with
the chambers set to boosts its
payment to £60,000 over the next
two years.
The chambers is to raise its current
pupillage award from £45,000 to
£50,000 – which includes £10,000
guaranteed earnings – for 2010-11.
The 2011-12 year will see the
award increase further, rising to
£60,000, comprising a £50,000
financial award and £10,000
guaranteed earnings.
The set currently has up to four
pupillage places on offer, but is
considering reducing that to three.
Four New Square’s pupillage
committee head Alex Hall Taylor
commented: “We recognised that
others in our field were raising their
awards, and as we compete with the
other top commercial sets to secure
the best candidates for pupillage, we
‘WE WANTED TO MAKE
SURE THAT WE HAD
COMPARABLE INCENTIVES’
Alex Hall Taylor, Four New Square
wanted to make sure that we had
comparable financial incentives.”
He added: “Although we consider
numerous other factors to be
important, such as the objective
fairness of our selection process and
that our pupils have considerable
opportunities to work on their own
account and to get into court early
on, we recognise that the financial
incentives offered are used by
candidates to gauge chambers’
standing and their own future
earnings prospects.”
The decision follows moves by
several other top commercial sets to
dramatically increase their pupillage
salaries.
One Essex Court will pay each of
its four new recruits commencing
pupillage in October 2010 £60,000
– a 33% increase on the £45,000
award that the set’s pupils currently
receive.
Essex Court Chambers will
increase its pupillage award from
£40,000 to £55,000 from October
2010, while Wilberforce Chambers is
increasing its payment by £8,000 to
£48,000 in 2011.
NORTHUMBRIA LAW SCHOOL EXCEEDS BVC STUDENT ALLOCATION
[email protected]
Northumbria Law School has
exceeded its allocated number of Bar
Vocational Course (BVC) places, it
has emerged one week after another
major provider asked Bar students
to defer.
Northumbria exceeded the
maximum figure of 100 BVC students
agreed with the Bar Standards Board
(BSB) on its full-time BVC by 30.
It has also been confirmed that
BPP Law School, which last month
asked for volunteers among its BVC
students to defer for a year, exceeded
its allocated numbers of 456 by 80.
This figure includes both the full-time
and part-time BVC courses run by BPP
in London and Leeds. It has since been
reduced to 63 as a result of deferrals
and withdrawals.
As an incentive to leave BPP’s
course (which commenced on 7
September), the law school has
offered a 15% reduction in fees on
next year’s course, which amounts
to a discount of over £2,000 on the
£14,700 course fees.
The BSB is currently exploring
what steps can be taken to ensure
that the delivery of the BVC remains
at a suitable standard if not enough
46 Legal Week Student
volunteers to defer can be found.
However, BPP Law School chief
executive Peter Crisp told Legal Week
that BPP has sufficient numbers and
quality of staff to deliver the course to
the extra students.
“We are a large, well-resourced
law school and therefore able to cope
with an additional 60 students on our
BVC. Our reputation is built on the
quality of our provision and we have
the staffing and accommodation to
teach the additional students in place.
Although the over-recruitment is
regrettable, the demand for places this
year is testament to our reputation as
the leading provider of the BVC.”
In a statement, Northumbria Law
School said that its over-recruitment
on the full-time BVC is offset by underrecruitment of 44 students on its parttime BVC and by seven students on its
LLB Barristers Exempting Degree.
It continues: “As such, the Law
School continues to resource the
programmes in excess of the BBS’s
resource requirements.”
A statement issued on 2 October
by the BSB reads as follows: “The
BSB takes this matter very seriously
due to the quality assurance issues
such over recruitment can cause. Both
cases are currently being considered
Autumn 2009
by the Bar professional training course
subcommittee.
“Further meetings on this matter
will be taking place with both
providers to ensure that the quality of
delivery of the course is not diminished
and that the interests of the students
currently on the course are not
affected. The BSB is also seeking
explanations from both providers as
to why the current situation has arisen
and the measures they will be putting
into place to prevent or limit the
possibility of it occurring again.”
BPP Law School: exceeded its Bar
Vocational Course allocation
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NEWS
FORMER BVC STUDENT WINS FOUR-YEAR BPP APPEALS
FOR BAR
LEGAL BATTLE OVER EXAM GRADES
STUDENTS TO
DEFER TWO
WEEKS INTO
COURSE
[email protected]
A former Bar Vocational Course
(BVC) student has won a longrunning legal battle against Cardiff
University to have her exam marks
increased.
A High Court decision on 19
August saw Mr Justice Wyn Williams
uphold claimant Alice Clarke’s case
against Cardiff University to increase
her BVC marks, bringing to an
end her four-year struggle against
the university.
Clarke was advised by Henderson
Chambers’ Patrick Green, who was
instructed by the Bar Pro Bono Unit.
Eversheds was instructed by
Cardiff University, with 11 King’s
Bench Walk’s Clive Lewis QC
instructed as counsel.
The case began after Cardiff
University failed Clarke in two
papers, grading her advanced
criminal law assessment at 40%
and a negotiation paper at 46%.
However, an independent assessment
[email protected]
Lewis: acted for
Alice Clarke
increased the criminal law mark
to 71%, while Clarke resat the
negotiation paper and achieved 62%.
Clarke had argued she had
been awarded low marks following
disagreements with some of her
tutors.
The High Court decision comes
after years of uneasiness surrounding
access to the Bar. Providers of
the BVC have been criticised for
consistently accepting large numbers
of students who have no realistic
prospect of going on to practice as
barristers. BVC fees are high – more
than £14,000 at some providers –
while pupillage numbers have
been declining.
OFT RAPS ‘UNNECESSARY’ PLANS
TO SET UP A BVC APTITUDE TEST
[email protected]
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has
criticised plans by the Bar Standards
Board (BSB) to bring in a compulsory
aptitude test for entry to the Bar
Vocational Course (BVC).
The test was one of a number of
recommendations made last year by a
BVC working party chaired by Derek
Wood QC.
It had been hoped that the aptitude
test would be brought in to coincide
with the introduction of the new Bar
Professional Training Course (BPTC),
which will replace the BVC from
autumn 2010. However, an OFT report
on the matter has concluded that the
test would have “the potential to have
a significant effect on competition
through unnecessary restriction of entry
into the profession.”
It adds that it would require
“ongoing, potentially costly, regulatory
oversight to ensure it did not become
an unnecessary restriction on
competition.”
Instead the OFT has proposed a
voluntary aptitude test as an alternative.
48 Legal Week Student
Wood: chair of BVC
working party
The BSB had hoped the aptitude test
would filter out those students unlikely
to pass the BVC. However it would
have had no effect on the main criticism
levelled against the BVC – that only a
very small percentage of students go
on to secure pupillages – as pass rates
have historically been high.
Commenting on the OFT’s position,
the BSB said: “We have received
comments from the OFT and will
Autumn 2009
respond to the Ministry of Justice in
due course. In developing the aptitude
test, we are taking steps to consult
extensively.The test will be piloted
before it is put into use as an admission
requirement for the BPTC.”
Between 2003 and 2007 the
number of students enrolling on the
BVC rose from 1,332 to 1,932, while
during the same period the number of
pupillages steadily fell to about 550.
BPP Law School has been forced to
appeal for volunteers to leave its Bar
Vocational Course (BVC) and take up
places next year.
The move comes at the request of
the Bar Standards Board (BSB), which
gives BVC course providers validated
numbers of students which they are
not permitted to exceed.
The email asking for volunteers
to leave and re-enrol in September
2010 was sent on 17 September
– 10 days after BPP’s BVC started on
7 September.
As an incentive to leave the
course, BPP has offered a 15%
reduction in fees on next year’s
course, which amounts to a discount
of more than £2,000 on the £14,700
course fees.
BPP chief executive Peter Crisp
commented: “Those who would
consider deferring have been invited
to contact the director of BVC
programmes to discuss. BPP has
emphasised that any decision to
defer needs to be carefully thought
through.”
In a statement, the BSB said:
“The BSB is committed to ensuring
the quality and standard of the
BVC. We are currently in dialogue
with BPP about the number of
students recruited on their courses
this year.”
The news, which was initially
reported on RollonFriday, follows
growing concerns about the
discrepancy between numbers of
students taking the BVC and the
number of pupillages available.
A total of 1,749 students enrolled
on the BVC in 2008-09, battling it out
for around 550 pupillages available.
The issue was looked at last year
by the BVC working party chaired by
Derek Wood QC of Falcon Chambers,
which had intended to introduce an
aptitude test to the new, revamped
BVC (which will be known as the Bar
Professional Training Course) until
concerns about its introduction were
raised by the Office of Fair Trading
earlier this year.
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BELONG
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– Your venture at Lovells can take you
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real opportunities to practise international work during your
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Our firmwide team delivers quality as standard and is committed
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Myriad, Astute and Belong at Lovells visit our graduate website
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200
9
SALARIES
Ben Rigby reports on the pupillage salary war under way at the commercial Bar
THE HIGHEST BIDDER IS…
The recent wave of pupillage salary
increases at the top commercial barristers’
chambers has certainly caused a stir.
It started earlier this year with Essex
Court Chambers’ decision to increase its
pupillage salary from £40,000 to £55,000
from October 2010, and was followed
by an announcement from One Essex
Court that it will pay each of its four new
recruits commencing pupillage next year
a salary of £60,000 – a 33% increase on
the £45,000 award that the set’s pupils
currently receive.
Subsequently Wilberforce Chambers,
Fountain Court Chambers and Four New
Square have followed suit with similar
increases. Significantly, pupillage awards
paid in the first six months are tax-exempt
– hence the common practice to offer a
larger proportion of the award in the first
six. One Essex Court, for example, will pay
its pupils £40,000 in the first six (tax-free),
with the remaining £20,000 paid in the
second-six (subject to tax, alongside any
additional earnings).
Some at the commercial Bar have
50 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
suggested that the increases were sparked
because chambers had been disappointed
with the quality of applicants they were
getting. But Darren Burrows, senior clerk
at One Essex Court,rejects this suggestion:
“Chambers has always placed a great value
in getting the best people. And we’ve been
very successful at it,” he says, pointing
out that there is no shortage of demand
for places. “Usually we review up to 200
applicants, which we then whittle down
to 60 interviewees, to gain four or five
successful people. And I think that we’ve
done extremely well with the pupils who
have become tenants.”
However, the likes of One Essex Court
clearly face competition from magic circle
and US law firms, which pay their trainees
about £40,000 and newly qualified lawyers
up to £90,000, while also providing
funding through law school. Moreover,
being a solicitor offers the security of
working in a large organisation where work
is guaranteed.
Down the line, commercial barristers’
salaries often eclipse those received by
City solicitors, but arguably top barristers’
chambers needed to do something to
distinguish themselves at entry level from
law firms.
Financial concerns
One of the most commonly voiced claims is
that rising student debt is behind the salary
increases. Alex Taylor, director of clerking at
Fountain Court, says: “Candidates primarily
focus on their long-term prospects. But
now, perhaps more than ever, they also
have more immediate financial concerns.
They usually come with a significant
student debt burden, especially if they have
completed a post-graduate degree, which
is common.”
However, this line of argument doesn’t
take into account the fact that almost all
those students who secure pupillages at the
leading commercial sets will have benefitted
from generous scholarships provided by
the Inns of Court, which offer merit-based
scholarships alongside the awards they
reserve for applicants in particular financial
Continued on page 52
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SALARIES
A VERY DIFFERENT PICTURE AT THE FAMILY BAR
Increased pupillage awards are not the norm
at the Bar. And it’s not only criminal barristers
who are struggling when it comes to pay (see
pages 40-42). Recent research reveals that
family barristers are pretty hard up too.
A study published earlier this year by Dr
Debora Price and Anne Laybourne of King’s
College London’s King’s Institute for the Study of
Public Policy, entitled The Work of the Family
Bar, paints a gloomy picture of a profession
struggling to cope with increasingly complex
caseloads, the pressure to protect the interests
of vulnerable clients, disruptive patterns of work
and repeated demoralising cuts in pay – and
argues that family barristers are being driven
away from the profession as a result.
Tight budgets
Lucy Theis QC, chair of the Family Law Bar
Association, says: “Legal aid pay for family
barristers lags far behind private client rates,
and below the rates paid by local authorities.
The differences are substantial, and they
already create significant inequalities in
representation in divorce cases between
need. These cover not only Bar Vocational
Course (BVC) fees – and in some cases
Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL) fees – but
also provide living allowances. “Often
our pupils receive scholarships, and of
course that’s a bonus – but by increasing
the size of our award, we’re helping them
ourselves too,” explains Burrows.
None of this is to suggest that the salary
increases at commercial chambers are
undeserved. Indeed, many claim that junior
barristers represent better value for money
than their solicitor counterparts.
52 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
those who can afford to pay for a barrister
themselves, and those who can’t.”
And proposed cuts to the Family
Graduated Fee Scheme could make the
situation worse. Ruth Cabeza, a junior barrister
at Field Court Chambers, says: “I’m concerned
about the impact of Family Graduated Fees on
the family Bar. My worry is that counsel will
either refuse to do the work at the rates being
offered or, worse, feel they have no choice
but to do the work, take on too much, and
standards will suffer.”
The survey found that family barristers
earn relatively modest professional incomes
given the complexity and seriousness of the
cases they deal with – a quarter of them earn
less than £44,000 a year, and half less than
£66,000 a year.
Almost all family barristers supplemented
their legal aid work with privately paid work.
But the more legal aid they did, the less they
earned overall.
Female barristers – especially black and
ethnic minority (BME) women – did the most
legal aid work and were the worst paid, with a
Jonathan Warne, a commercial
litigation partner at Nabarro, says: “Junior
members of the Bar are actually very
good value. They can help with drafting,
especially drafting pleadings, and are cost
competitive on those kind of issues that
can frequently cost too much to undertake
within a law firm. We might produce draft
pleadings and we’ll ask a junior to polish
and finalise these.”
While there will clearly be a pressure on
all commercial sets to up their pupillage
awards in line with Essex Court et al, not
quarter of female BME barristers earning less
than £32,000 a year.
In the context of the tough times the family
Bar is going through, might family pupils expect
cuts in their awards?
Charles Hale, chairman of the Bar’s public
affairs committee and a barrister at family set 4
Paper Buildings, says: “We are taking seriously
the proposed cuts and the significant effect
these may have on our income.”
However, he adds that his set has no plans to
reduce its current pupillage award of £20,000,
plus earnings of at least £6,000 in the second
six months.
Andrew Powell, who has just finished
pupillage and joined 4 Paper Buildings as a
tenant, says: “Funding by the Legal Services
Commission (LSC) has a real impact. I’m
proud of the work I do as a family pupil, but
that work also needs to be funded properly
so I can continue to do it! If the LSC is serious
about attracting individuals from all
sections of society into the profession, then it
should look again at how it
encourages this.”
everyone will be increasing what they pay
their pupils. Andrew Burns, chairman of
Devereux Chambers’ pupillage committee,
says his set’s pupillage award will remain
at £35,000. “Devereux has always relied
on its reputation to attract the best pupils,
rather than trying to offer the largest
awards and this has been a very successful
policy in recent years,” he adds.
“We are convinced that the top
applicants are more interested in firstrate training and outstanding career
opportunities when choosing chambers.”
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STEP BY STEP
HOW TO
Legal Week Student
give you the inside
track on planning a
career at the Bar
BECOME A
BARRISTER
STEP 1: Get your degree
A qualifying law degree is traditionally
the first step on the road to becoming
a barrister. It will exempt you from the
Common Professional Examination (CPE)
or Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL),
provided it covers all seven foundations of
legal knowledge: obligations I (contract)
and II (tort); criminal law; equity and law of
trusts; European Union (EU) law; property
law; and public law.
However, an extra hurdle awaits
applicants for many of the UK’s leading
universities, following the introduction
of the National Admissions Test for
Law (LNAT), a uniform legal exam that
must be completed before advancing
to the undergraduate law courses of
participating universities.
The following universities are signed
up to LNAT: University of Birmingham,
University of Bristol, University of
Cambridge, Durham University,
National University of Ireland Maynooth,
University of Exeter, University of
Glasgow, King’s College London,
University of Nottingham, University
of Oxford and University College London.
Registration for this year’s exam can be
completed online from 1 August and costs
£40 within the EU.
Around this stage, it is always
advisable to do a mini-pupillage at a set
of chambers. The experience you will get
from this – and the contacts you cultivate
– will be very helpful when it comes to
applying for Bar school and scouring
about for pupillages.
STEP 2: If you do not have a
qualifying law degree, you
will have to take the Common
Professional Examination (CPE) or
Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL)
We are a large modern set operating from state of the art premises in the
Temple.We have 76 tenants and practise in the areas of commercial, EU,
employment, public and human rights law; several members of Chambers
are also leading practitioners in the public international law field. As a pupil
in Blackstone Chambers you will receive a thorough and varied training
in all aspects of Chambers’ work.
Applications for pupillage are made via OLPAS (summer season) and we
are offering four (or, exceptionally, five) 12-month pupillages with individual
awards of £42,500 for the 2011 year of intake.We will also consider
applications for an advance of up to £10,000 of the award payable during
the BVC year.
Information is available on our website: www.blackstonechambers.com or
contact Julia Hornor, our Chambers Director, with any queries or requests
for brochures and application forms.
Blackstone Chambers
Blackstone House Temple London EC4Y 9BW
Telephone: 020 7583 1770
Email: [email protected] www.blackstonechambers.com
54 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
It is always
advisable to
do a minipupillage
at a set of
chambers.
The
experience
and the
contacts
you make
there will
be very
helpful
How long? One year (full-time); two
years (part-time).
How much? Up to £8,735.
When to apply: Third or final year of
your degree.
Following the law degree route is the
main way to becoming a barrister. But
there is evidence that chambers, like
law firms, look favourably on candidates
who choose the CPE/GDL route because
of the wider range of experience they
get. The CPE/GDL comprises one three
hour examination in each of the seven
foundations of legal knowledge, plus one
other area of legal study.
The course is offered by a multitude
of institutions across the country, from
universities to traditional law schools
(details of providers are on the Solicitors
Regulation Authority website).
However, applications for full-time
courses should be made centrally by
1 February of the year of entry to the
CPE Applications Board, PO Box 84,
Guildford, Surrey GU3 1YX. Forms can
be downloaded from lawcabs.ac.uk or
www.legalweek.com/students
completed online. Applications for parttime courses should be made directly to
the relevant college.
Competition for places on the
course can be fierce. In most colleges,
the minimum grade is a 2:2, but the
substantial majority of students hold a
2:1. Full-time students have three years in
which to complete the CPE/GDL. Except
in extreme circumstances, a candidate
cannot sit for an examination on more
than three occasions. Completion of the
CPE/GDL does not automatically guarantee
a place on the BVC. However, there are
some institutions that do assure places if
the CPE is passed at the same college. So
check this when applying. It is also worth
checking the Bar contacts of your CPE
course provider. These can be helpful in
securing that useful mini-pupillage.
STEP 3: Bar Vocational Course
(BVC)
How long? One year (full-time); two
years (part-time).
How much? Up to £14,700.
When to apply: During the final
year of a qualifying law degree or at the
beginning of the CPE/GDL course for
non-law graduates. All students must
join one of the four Inns of Court – Gray’s
Inn, Lincoln’s Inn, Inner Temple or Middle
Temple – before registering on the BVC.
Eight educational establishments offer
the course. The purpose of the BVC is
to ensure students acquire the skills,
knowledge of procedure and evidence,
attitudes and competence to prepare them
for the more specialised training in the
following 12 months of pupillage. Some
variance exists between the courses.
However, the main skills taught are divided
into three groups: casework, which covers
fact management and legal research;
written skills, which comprises general
word skills, opinion writing and drafting of
documents; and interpersonal skills, which
concentrates on interviewing clients,
negotiation and advocacy.
In terms of legal knowledge, the
BVC covers civil and criminal litigation,
evidence, sentencing and two optional
subjects selected from a list of at least
six. Assessment is by multiple choice
and written papers, as well as by videorecorded performance for the interpersonal
skills modules. Applications can be made
online at bvconline.co.uk. In the past, the
pass rate has been about 80%. Academic
achievement is the primary consideration
when awarding places and the minimum
required degree grade is a 2:2 – although
the majority of students have a 2:1.
Pupillage must be started within five years
of completing the BVC.
STEP 4: Pupillage
How long? One year.
How much? They pay you. The
minimum award (including any fees
earned) is £5,000 for each six-month term.
When to apply: The year prior to
starting your BVC. To facilitate the
pupillage applications process, the Bar
FOUR NEW SQUARE
“ This is a Commercial and Civil set. Chambers combines a commitment to achieving
and maintaining the highest standards of advocacy and advice for all clients with
the very highest standards of client service. This is reflected in the large awards
and guaranteed earnings offered to its pupils, from whom its junior tenants
are regularly recruited ”
(Chambers and Partners 2008)
“Four New Square delivers a very good, solid, responsive service, and is very
efficient, leading to pleasingly low fees”
(Legal 500 2008)
For full details of Chambers’ work, individual members’
practice profiles and clerking arrangements please visit
www.4newsquare.com or contact Lizzy Wiseman
on 020 7822 2000 or [email protected]
www.legalweek.com/students
4 New Square, Lincoln’s Inn London WC2A 3RJ
Telephone: 020 7822 2000 Facsimile: 020 7822 2001
Email:[email protected]
DX: 1041 London, Chancery Lane
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
55
STEP BY STEP
Council has created the OLPAS system,
allowing direct communication between
applicants and chambers through a
website. Application forms, and offer or
interview letters, are handled online. There
are two deadlines each year. Students
should go to the ‘Pupillage Portal’ website
for details of OLPAS and the timetable.
The rules state that all pupillages must
be advertised on this website. Vacancies
will not appear directly on the site, but
there are direct links to all pupillage
information and vacancies, both OLPAS
and non-OLPAS. The site acts as a gateway
to the information, meaning prospective
pupils can get all the data they need from
one source. Pupillage is the final stage of
qualification to the Bar, with pupils gaining
practical training under the supervision of
an experienced barrister. It is divided into
two six-monthly parts: the ‘first six’ and
‘second six’. All pupillages are full-time.
Working under the tutelage of a
pupilmaster or mistress, the pupil is
expected to successfully complete a
checklist of experience, which is usually
tailored to the particular specialism of the
chambers. However, pupillage will include
most aspects of chambers life, from
dealing with clerks to client conferences
to advocacy. Full details, including a
sample completed checklist, are on the Bar
Council website.
The first six months are non-practising.
Much of this time is spent shadowing the
pupilmaster or mistress. Previously, it was
compulsory for this time to be served in
a set of chambers. However, the rules
have been changed to allow law firms
and commercial companies that employ
barristers to offer both first and second
‘sixes’. During the second six, the pupil is
permitted to practise and to accept paid
instructions from clients. It must be started
within 12 months of completing the first
six. The second six may be completed
at one of several locations: in the same
chambers; at another set or partially at a
solicitor’s office (in the UK or the European
Union (EU)); at the European Commission
(EC) in Brussels or Luxembourg; with
a High Court or circuit judge; or with
a solicitor or other professional with a
practice relevant to your chambers.
In addition, the full second six can be
served with an ‘employed’ barrister in
industry or with the EC in London. Full
details are available on the Bar Council
website. As well as completing the
checklist and satisfying their pupilmaster
or mistress, pupils must complete further
external training modules in advocacy
training, advice to counsel (a practical
course on working as a barrister) and
forensic accountancy – either during
pupillage or within the first three years
Some
chambers
take pupils
with a view
to giving
them all a
tenancy if
they make
the grade,
while
others take
on more
than they
need and
select the
best at
the end
of practice. On successful completion of
the second six and associated red tape,
you will receive your final certificate. This
will enable you to practise unsupervised.
Chambers offer about 500 pupillages each
year. Competition is intense, so apply as
early as possible.
STEP 5: Get a tenancy
Tenancies, whether at the chambers
where you trained or elsewhere, have to
be applied for. They are not offered as a
matter of right on successful qualification.
Some chambers take pupils with a view to
giving them all a tenancy if they make the
grade, while others take on more than they
need and select the best at the end.
Pupillage is often described as a yearlong job interview. To pass, pupils must
show all-round ability, particularly in
advocacy, research and writing skills. The
decision on whether to grant a tenancy is
often taken by committee, a little while
before the end of the second six.
If you do find yourself without a
tenancy, there are several options. You
can apply to do a ‘third six’ or ‘squat’ at
another chambers, or you can work in
commerce and industry. There are around
2,500 employed barristers in this field.
Information on this can be obtained from
the Bar Association for Commerce, Finance
& Industry.
How can a hard-up barrister drum up more business?
My partner is a very competent and experienced criminal barrister who needs to gain more work, but assures me ‘it is not the
done thing’ to market yourself directly to solicitors. I would like to send out his profile and credentials to a select number of criminal
solicitors, but could this be detrimental to his career? What else are criminal barristers currently doing to increase their dwindling
salaries? Any ideas would be welcome.
I believe the traditional solution involves
getting the senior clerk bladdered.
Anonymous
Your partner should devise, write, pitch
and deliver seminars on hot topics which
cover CPD requirements to the firms he
would like to work for. Pick the right topic
and a bunch of firms will want to have the
seminar delivered. Make sure that there is
the opportunity of some face-to-face time
at the end of each seminar and don’t leave
without a couple of business cards and
follow up to meet these individuals for a
drink shortly afterwards.
I am a 10 years’ call commercial barrister
and I get at least half of my work through
my own efforts. I won’t say how much I
make since it is not relevant to a criminal
practice, but I do substantially better than
okay and a lot of that is due to personal
marketing. Commercial Barrister
Talk to your more senior trusted colleagues
who can talk you through their procedure
for obtaining work. Getting on well with
the senior clerk is an obvious route and
that involves making your skills known.
If your chambers have little criminal
work, rather than it being the case that
you are just not getting any, then it’s
time to crack open the champagne and
invite the law firms over. If you are good
at what you do the work will follow.
US Associate
I would be surprised if any (substantial)
work came in from a “cold call” exercise of
sending out profiles. I’ve tried this and it
doesn’t work, primarily because law firms
already have barristers they use with great
credentials and your partner needs to give
them a better reason than a piece of paper
from someone they don’t know to use him
56 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
instead of the people they currently use.
People buy people and this is especially
true with a referral profession such as the
Bar. Your partner needs to make the effort
to market himself to the people in a way
that makes him sellable/buyable.
Your partner’s chambers need to support
him in his marketing efforts. If they don’t,
then they are in for a rude awakening.
Marketing is going to be even more
important once legal services reform is
here. Lawlord
www.legalweek.com/students
BAR
Serle Court barristers
Gareth Tilley and
James Mather on why
the often overlooked
area of chancery law
is a good bet for
aspiring barristers
To be completely honest, chancery
chose me rather than me choosing it. At
law school I was keen on a whole load
of subjects, but knew I would have to
specialise eventually. I didn’t begin my
university studies with law – I was a
musician. But that never felt like it was
the right thing for me so I made a quick
side-step to law school. After law school
I qualified as a solicitor in New South
Wales (I’m from Sydney) and worked in a
commercial law firm for a few months and
then as an associate for a chancery judge
for about a year.
I moved to England to seek my
fortune and studied a master’s degree
in restitution since it involved a lot of
areas I liked – such as contract, trusts
and property. Then all of a sudden my CV
looked pretty strong chancery-wise and
it made sense to continue in that vein at
the Bar.
WORTH
TAKING A
CHANCE ON
The great thing about chancery,
particularly commercial chancery, is the
variety – one day you’re in a Dickens
novel arguing about whether an evil
aunt drugged granddad to get him to
change his will; the next day you might
be on a massive multi-party dispute
‘The great
thing about
commercial
chancery is
the variety’
about misrepresentations made in the
takeover of an insurance company. At the
moment I’m principally briefed in a longrunning offshore trusts dispute with a very
distinguished leader. This has been great
both as a learning experience, for a bit of
cash-flow stability, and to get exposure to
Commercial Law
3 Verulam
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VerulamBuildings
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combined
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c
one
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attitude. 3 Verulam Buildings is well known
and
its
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3VB
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for
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its
toin
work
as
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of a team with
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and
and
the
its members
to work as
of a teamtrade).
with solicitors and clients.
entertainment
andof
media,
IT and telecoms
andpart
international
Chambers provides litigation and advisory se
Chambers
provides
litigation
and advisory services across
across
a wide range
of commercial
law.
Commercial
practice is intellectually demanding and 3VB
Specialising
in:
a wide range of commercial law, with
seeks the brightest and the best pupils, who
particular specialisms in:
will thenArbitration
train with some of London’s leading commercial juniors.
• Commercial
• Banking
• Commercial Fraud
• Insolvency
• Commercial Arbitration
• Financial Services
Pupillage:
Applications
for
pupillage
commencing
in
October
2011
should
made
through
the Pupillage
• be
Cross
Border
Disputes
• Professional Negligence
• Banking
• Insurance
and Reinsurance
Portal in spring 2010. Our pupils receive a generous pupillage award, the exact amount of which is currently
• Insolvency
• Building and Construction
• Entertainment and Media
• Financial
Services
• Professional
Negligence
under review
(please see our website), up to £15,000 of which may drawn down during the BVC year, in
• Entertainment
Media
• International Trade
• IT and
Telecoms
• Insurance
and
Reinsurance
addition
toand
any
earnings
they make during
their
practising six months.
• IT and Telecoms
• Commercial Fraud
As a pupil at 3VB you will train with some of London’s leading commercial lawyers in a supportive
• Cross
Border Disputes
Mini-pupillages:
We offer three-day mini-pupillages all year round: email Fred Hobson at
atmosphere.
Applicationswith
for pupillage
commencing
in October 2010 should be made through the current
• Building
and Construction
[email protected]
a CV and covering
letter.
• International
Trade summer season. Our pupils receive a pupillage award of £42,500, up to £15,000 of which
OLPAS
For details on these and othe
may drawn down during
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vitae
please visit our website
six months.
www.3vb.Com or contact Nic
Senior Practice Manager.
the BVC year, in addition to any earnings they make during their practising
For further information please contact Adam Kramer at [email protected]
or visit our website at www.3vb.com.
For further information please contact Adam Kramer or visit our website at www.3vb.com
58 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
www.legalweek.com/students
great practitioners in the field. I also find
time to squeeze in smaller matters of my
own like small commercial claims in the
County Court or company applications in
the High Court.
Gareth Tilley is a junior barrister at Serle Court
chambers.
Like Gareth I came to the law fairly late
– my undergraduate degree was in
history. Although chancery work is often
quite technical and legalistic, that sort of
background is common in this part of the
Bar and certainly no handicap. In the early
years at least, encyclopaedic knowledge
is less important than the ability to get on
top of areas that you might have little or
no previous experience of, in double quick
time. For me, that’s a major part of what
keeps the job interesting.
Another is the stories. Variety is the
name of the game. Each dispute tends to
give you a glimpse into some slice of life
or some colourful personality, the likes of
which you haven’t seen before.
Part of the skill in any litigation is
turning your client’s version of events
into a narrative that a court can readily
understand. That tends to bring you,
whether for a week a month or a day, to a
fleeting familiarity with your client’s world,
only for your next case to draw you into
quite another.
‘Chancery’, as a description of a part
of the modern Bar, is one of those words
that probably does more to confuse than
to clarify. There’s a large overlap with
the ‘commercial’ Bar, partly reflecting
the courts’ growing tendency to draw on
equitable concepts such as fiduciary duties
as a tool for regulating commercial life.
As a result, which camp you find
yourself in only does so much to dictate
the kind of cases you might find yourself
working on. Still, there remains a
Essex Court Chambers
Have you got
what it takes
to join the best?
IT’S NOT JUST WILLS
The Chancery Bar Association has recently published a
new brochure – available at www.chba.org.uk/?a=66933
– emphasising that recruitment into chancery sets is based on
merit, not on what school or university you went to, and that
the work encompasses not only the traditional areas but also
more commercial aspects of company law.
The brochure aims to correct the perception held by many
students that chancery law is stuck in the 19th Century and
confined to dealing with wills. It outlines the fact that when
the credit crunch hit it was the chancery lawyers to whom the
banks facing financial meltdown turned – with a lot of the
issues relating to the Lehman Brothers’ collapse being heard by
the Chancery Division of the High Court. It also explains how
traditional chancery concepts such as trusts are relevant models
for modern business structures.
‘There’s
no doubt
chancery
is tough
– but don’t
let that put
you off’
James Mather is a junior barrister at Serle Court
chambers.
Consistently ranked as a first division set and its
members as leading individuals, Essex Court
Chambers offers up to four 12-month fully funded
pupillages each year. Applications (Summer OLPAS)
are welcome from both law and non-law graduates.
What does it take to join the best?
If you have the desire and ability to succeed in an
intellectually challenging environment and believe
you can be one of the future’s stars at the bar, contact
the pupillage secretary at [email protected]
or visit chambers’ website www.essexcourt.net
Sponsors of the ESU – Essex Court Chambers National Mooting
Competition for the tenth year running.
Essex Court Chambers
24 Lincoln’s Inn Fields
London WC2A 3EG
www.legalweek.com/students
difference of culture and approach that is
as intangible as it is real.
There’s no doubt that chancery is tough
– it’s very academic and there’s a lot of
talent vying for the top chambers. But
don’t let that put you off. If you like the
sort of work involved and are prepared to
work hard, it brings great rewards. Being
your own boss from day one of your career
is unbeatable, no two cases are the same,
and the collegiality in chambers creates a
great environment to work in. And to top it
all off, on some days you walk into court,
persuade someone of your argument, and
bring a bit of justice about for your client.
And that really makes it worth the effort.
T +44 (0) 207 813 8000
F +44 (0) 207 813 8080
DX No 320
E [email protected]
W www.essexcourt.net
Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
59
TIME OUT
One of the joys of the Bar is that you are
self-employed and therefore get a lot
more freedom over your own destiny than
most. For my part, as a keen surfer, this
meant that over the years as a common
law barrister at 1 Temple Gardens I have
frequently been able to take breaks by
the coast to catch the odd wave when
the surfing conditions were right. It also
meant that I had time to indulge another
hobby, writing.
Having brought together these two
interests in my first book, Why Lawyers
Should Surf, which I co-wrote with Dr
Michelle Tempest, I still had an ambition
to write a novel, especially a legal thriller.
But instead what popped out was a legal
comedy about a fictional young barrister
doing pupillage.
I called him BabyBarista, which was a
play on words based on his first impression
being that his coffee-making skills were
probably as important to that first year at
the Bar as any forensic legal abilities he
may have. It’s a strange thing to say, but
I discovered that this bold, irreverent and
mischievous voice, along with a collection
of colourful characters, had simply jumped
into my head and the words started
pouring onto the page.
I wrote it in the form of a diary and
posted it online as a blog. I was hopeful
it might raise a few smiles, but in my
wildest dreams I never imagined the
extraordinary set of circumstances that
then unfolded. Having been approached
by a literary agent, I was contacted by The
Times, which offered to host the blog, and
then I got a book deal with Bloomsbury
Publishing. All of this happened within the
space of less than three months.
In the meantime, I had co-founded
a couple of legal businesses that
were starting to take off – the first
providing free legal email newsletters
(lawbriefupdate.com) and a subscription
law journal; the second involving online
continuing professional development
training for personal injury and
employment lawyers through video
seminars (cpdwebinars.com).
60 Legal Week Student Autumn 2009
Sally Evans
Being self-employed
has given 1 Temple
Gardens barrister
Tim Kevan the
flexibility to pursue his
non-legal passions
LAW, NOVELS
AND SURF TRIPS
With all this going on, I was still trying
to get down to the coast as much as
possible. I had bought a house in North
Devon, not far away from where I had
been brought up, near to the various
surfing beaches in that area. While trying
to juggle all of these things, I eventually
decided to move down there full-time
and take a break from the Bar. It meant
I could finish the novel and work on the
businesses, as well as getting into the sea
whenever there was swell.
Freedom
Since then I’ve sold my flat in Soho, central
London, and paid off the mortgage down
here, freeing me up financially. It’s also
been a long haul both with finishing the
first draft of the book, and then the editing
that followed, as well as being involved
with the businesses.
The book itself is called BabyBarista
and the Art of War and it came out in
August. It centres around BabyBarista’s
first year in chambers, where he is fighting
his fellow pupils for the coveted prize of a
permanent tenancy.
It’s a fictional caricature of life at the
Bar and includes characters that probably
exist in most workplaces. Alongside the
pupillage race is an altogether different
battle with BabyBarista’s corrupt
pupilmaster, TheBoss, whose dishonest
fiddling of chambers’ records to avoid a
negligence action all starts to unravel
and threatens to embroil BabyBarista’s
entire career.
Thankfully, it seems to have been wellreceived, with broadcaster Jeremy Vine
describing it as “a wonderful, racing
read – well-drawn, smartly plotted
and laugh out loud”, The Times books
I still had
an ambition
to write
a novel,
especially
a legal
thriller. But
instead
what
popped out
was a legal
comedy
about a
fictional
young
barrister
doing
pupillage
section mentioning its “relentlessly racy,
rumbustiously Rumpolean humour” and
Thom Dyke in Legal Week suggesting
that the book is “compulsory reading for
prospective pupils and pupilmasters alike”.
It’s certainly been an exhilarating
period, and wonderful to have some time
out to concentrate on other things than
law. Being back down by the sea has really
made me appreciate how important it is
to concentrate on the quality of life and to
give myself the time and space to pursue
passions and interests.
Quality time
That has meant getting out into the sea
and enjoying all that the countryside has
to offer. This has not just been through
surfing, but also through simple pleasures
such as taking on a little border terrier
puppy and getting him out on to the beach
and into the hills and rivers, growing
stuff in the garden from runner beans to
rhubarb, and even brewing elderflower
wine and making sloe gin.
Work-wise, I’m continuing to write the
blog for The Times, as well as working on
a sequel to the novel and watching over
the two businesses. Ultimately, I intend
to return to the Bar part-time, based in
Devon, but hopefully through my chambers
in London.
The perspective of having spent time
out should ensure that I maintain some
sort of balance; not only between work
and play, but also between the various
different types of work that we as lawyers
are able to take on.
Tim Kevan is a barrister at 1 Temple Gardens and
the author of BabyBarista and The Art of War,
published by Bloomsbury. For more information,
visit www.timkevan.com.
www.legalweek.com/students
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