Pastafarians preferred, says an Auckland barrister in desperate bid to replace the last chap, who never fit in owing to odd film tastes

Being cooped up in chambers at the other end of the world has clearly taken its toll on three barristers — although, being Kiwis, they probably don’t see it as the other end of the world.

One is leaving Auckland set Eden Chambers and the advertisements (see in full below) for his replacement says much about the two remaining characters.

First, Ray Parmenter, a land law litigation specialist called to the bar in 1978, took out an advertisement in Law News, the weekly newspaper for members of the Auckland District Law Society.

He hints that the last 15 years have been something of a trial for the set as the departing barrister just didn’t fit in. Indeed, his main crimes seem to be never having watched US telly sensation Game of Thrones and tackling the Quentin Tarantino 2003-04 film epic Kill Bill duology the wrong way round.

Parmenter goes on to describe his remaining chambers-mate, William McCartney, as a “high functioning Aspergers”, before writing himself off as being “a bit inflexible” — something to do with dishwasher etiquette.

He finishes with a nod to discrimination law, indicating that ideally applicants will be keen Pastafarians (for the uninitiated, that’s a reference to adherents of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and a member is pictured below.)

Not to be outdone, McCartney took out a sister advert pleading — perhaps understandably — not to be “left alone” with Parmenter.

Anyone currently scrabbling around London’s Inns of Court cursing tumbling legal aid rates might like to chance an arm. And to give them a head start, Legal Cheek lists the main beliefs of that Spag Monster Church:

Pirates are pretty crucial. According to the church’s website, “the original Pastafarians, were peaceful explorers and it was due to Christian misinformation that they have an image of outcast criminals today”.

A keen fondness for beer.

All Fridays are religious holidays.

Pastafarians “do not take ourselves too seriously”.

They embrace contradictions — “though in that we are hardly unique”.

Read the advert in full below:

h/t @vernontava

The post Fed up with the grind at the English bar? Perhaps this set of Kiwi jokers appeals… appeared first on Legal Cheek.

A round-up of the party election manifestos demonstrates yet again that while the legal profession might have right on its side, the political establishment of all colours doesn’t give a monkey’s

It seems as though the general election campaign has been running for an eternity, so The Judge will try to keep this short.

Indeed, in the old days — five years ago — we’d already be approaching the final week before polling day. As it is, punters and word-weary pundits have nearly three more weeks of this circus before all eyes turn to the swingometer.

In any event, the manifestos are all published. And while most punters won’t be troubled by even the abridged, bite-sized versions, obsessive lawyers have been tweeting their analysis of which of the parties — if any — are legal profession-friendly.

So — do any of the main parties care about lawyers, apart from fielding a fair few as parliamentary candidates? Not really. That’s because of one racing certainty in every general election of the last generation: there ain’t no votes in legal aid.

Hard pressed legal aid lawyers would love to think that if the argument could just be made clearly, the public would see the light and realise that access to justice is equally important in a civilised society as access to health care.

But politicians of all hues know better. They realise that while just about everyone at some stage in their lives becomes poorly enough to require a GP or hospital visit, most people don’t require significant legal advice (and no, residential conveyancing specialists, buying a semi-detached in suburbia doesn’t count).

More importantly, the reason there is a much loved National Health Service and a now nearly dead publicly funded legal service is that doctors and nurses are seen as angles of life, whereas lawyers are seen as pompous, fat-cat purveyors of mumbo-jumbo.

If nothing else, the fat cat perception — as far as the state-funded sector is concerned — is ironically wrong. Thanks to the last Labour government, GPs and hospital consultants coin it from the public purse, far outstripping the earnings of average high street legal aid solicitors and their barrister colleagues.

However, politicians realised ages ago that rewarding the medical profession — the sort of people that patch up little Tommy when he tumbles off his bike, or miraculously save your spouse from the ravages of cancer — is far more popular than chucking money at those characters defending murderers, rapists and benefit-scrounging asylum-seekers.

And while legal aid lawyers relish pillaring the current Lord Chancellor as a failed television executive, Chris Grayling is acutely aware of that public attitude. He may face the odd frosty reception at legal profession soirees, but the chances of the Justice Secretary taking regular ear-bashings about his legal aid reforms from many on his constituency doorsteps is low at best.

That’s why the main legal affairs reference in the 2015 Tory party manifesto involved the pressing of that crowd-pleasing button about binning the Human Rights Act. Following that was a brief confirmation that it would be full steam ahead with the legal aid reforms.

Any legal aid lawyer banking on Labour to jump onto a white charger to ride to the rescue is delusional.

The party’s manifesto commits Labour to keeping the HRA and widening Freedom of Information Act access (despite form Prime Minister Tony Blair famously regretting having brought the legislation in). But Ed Miliband’s party is vague at best on whether it would even partially reverse the coalition’s bonfire of legal aid fee rates and eligibility. Which makes sense, as deep down in their memories, senior Labour figures recall that their party kicked off the reform process in the first place.

To be fair, the Liberal-Democrats devote the most manifesto ink to legal aid issues. “Access to justice is an essential part of a free society and a functioning legal system,” says Nick Clegg’s party nobly, before acknowledging:

“In this parliament we have had to make significant savings from the legal aid budget, but in the next parliament our priority for delivering efficiency in the Ministry of Justice should be prison and court reform, using technology and innovation to reduce costs.”

What’s more, say the Cleggers, in government the party would “review the criminal legal aid market and ensure there are no further savings without an impact assessment as to the viability of a competitive and diverse market of legal aid providers”.

But the only way the Lib-Dems will return to government will be as an even weaker prop to an either Tory of Labour master, neither of which looks that minded to playing nicely with the legal aid fraternity.

Indeed, in a pure fantasy world, every man and woman Jack and Jacqueline legal aid lawyer should slap on a Green rosette. The manifesto of Natalie Bennett’s party has a short but sweet statement on the subject:

“Make equality before the law a fundamental constitutional right. But this is only a reality if all can afford to use the law. We would restore the cuts to legal aid.”

But it will be tobogganing week in hell before the Greens form any part of a coalition. The best they’ll be hoping for is being able to have the odd word with a minority Labour government, and they are likely to see other words as being more important than legal aid.

All of which boils down to this a crucial life lesson: if you want to be courted by politicians and loved by the public, go to medical school.

Previously:

Ukip manifesto pledges to protect ‘British law’ (even though ‘British law’ isn’t a thing) [Legal Cheek]

Legal profession doesn’t rate Tory manifesto pledge to scrap Human Rights Act [Legal Cheek]

Labour politicians don’t want to talk about their vague legal aid manifesto pledge on Twitter [Legal Cheek]

The post The Judge Rules: Politicians hate lawyers – and always have appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Harnessing the drudgery of life at the bottom of the legal food chain to launch an alternative career

From Lock Stock to Snatch, Legal Cheek has always felt that there is something missing from gritty British gangster flicks: paralegals.

Legal Practice Course (LPC) grad-turned-film producer Omar Ismail has used his time at the legal coalface working as a paralegal as inspiration for his film entitled ‘A Reasonably Good Bloke’. It sees gun-wielding paralegals come face-to-face with gangsters …

The film tells the story of a struggling paralegal named Jackie, who is played by relatively unknown actor Miles Le Versha. Jackie is dismissed from his job for gross misconduct and hatches a plan to secure his own client base by associating with various criminals.

The film’s trailer — which was released earlier this week — shows Jackie and a colleague getting dragged into the murky underworld of criminal activity. Set in South London and shot in black and white, the dark comedy thriller gives a subtle nod to the struggles faced by those currently working in criminal law.

Now managing director of Crixton Films, Ismail — who did his undergraduate degree in mathematics at UCL — quit the legal scene last year to pursue his dream career in film production. Having originally studied for his Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL) at BPP in 2007 he then embarked on the LPC at the then College of Law in 2009, gaining a distinction.

Yesterday Legal Cheek caught up with him. He told us:

“My inspiration perhaps comes from the fact that I used to work in a law firm as a paralegal myself. I have therefore experienced some of the growing difficulties experienced by some very hardworking paralegals who are trying to obtain training contracts, and who have to possibly do long stints of unpaid work before being employed.”

Critics might argue that Ismali has opted for one of the few careers out there even more difficult to succeed in than criminal law. But judging by the impressive ‘A Reasonably Good Bloke’ trailer, he is at least in with a shot.

The former paralegal plans to enter his production into various film festivals over the coming week before releasing it to the general public later this year.

Watch the trailer in full below:

A Reasonably Good Bloke: Official Trailer from Crixton Films Ltd. on Vimeo.

The post An LPC grad has made a gangster film about paralegals appeared first on Legal Cheek.

It’s Friday — so brace yourselves for a spot of scatological reporting

In what doubtless recalled one of cinema’s most famous episodes — the campfire scene in Mel Brooks’s 1974 classic Blazing Saddles — a courtroom in the East Midlands was cleared earlier this week owing to a particularly noxious incidence of flatulence.

A report in the Mansfield and Ashfield Chad (formerly Chronicle and Advertiser) newspaper sets out the grim details.

About 10 local citizens were whiling away an afternoon watching justice in action from the public gallery at Mansfield Mags two days ago. Indeed, they were particularly focused on the intricacies of an assault trial, which had moved to the climatic point of sentencing.

Their worships were just about to send the defendant down when … somebody farted. Really loudly, and odoriferously.

And just as with Brooks’s railway gang-masters and their baked beans experience, the breaking of wind caused great mirth. According to the newspaper, so much mirth was triggered by the gaseous expulsion that the magistrates instructed the court usher to clear the public gallery.

Those still with this story will be interested to learn that courtroom farting is by no means as rare as one might imagine. A quick Internet search produces several references, with, bizarrely, some instances actually posted on YouTube.

There is even a fart reference in a YouTube piece relating to US television sensation Judge Judy, suggesting it is only a matter of time before our own Judge Rinder will have to deal with something similar.

And of course, last September, we reported on the horse that actually followed through in a courtroom in Ohio. While back on this side of the Atlantic, at the beginning of the year Legal Cheek had the dignified responsibility of bringing the news of the nasty discovery of feaces smack in the middle of the entrance to a courtroom at Westminster Magistrates.

The post Breaking news (er … wind) — fart clears East Midlands courtroom appeared first on Legal Cheek.

There’s good news and bad in the figures — retention is rising, but overall training contracts numbers are still shrinking

The good news: the UK’s big law firms have continued to build on 2014’s reversal of a two-year dip in the numbers of qualifying lawyers retained.

The average figure for the spring 2015 round of nearly 84% for those firms that have reported so far is a welcome improvement on last year’s figure of 81%. And it is significantly better than the 78% in 2013, and the 79% in 2012.

Certainly current retention of qualifying solicitors at the big firms is a damn sight better than it was during the murky depths of the global financial crisis. When the developed world’s economy tanked nearly seven years ago, socially conscious law firms reacted by waving good-bye to as many NQs as possible. According to data dredged up from the Chambers Student archive, the 2009 average retention rate plummeted to 74%.

With the average now having recovered by 10 points from those dark financial crisis days — and surpassing the peak pre-crisis point of 82% in 2008 — can law students breathe a sigh of relief as they rack up pre-qualification debts north of £50,000?

The bad news: No, not really. While the newly-qualified retention rate average is increasing, it is doing so from a smaller overall pool of trainees. Figures for the magic circle are striking and are illustrative of the rest of the commercial law sector.

At the peak of the boom in 2007-08, the magic circle firms on average offered 120 training contract places annually. Those numbers are now generally down by 25% to an average of 90 places on offer each year. Linklaters and Clifford Chance are the exceptions, offering 110 and 100 places respectively. But Allen & Overy is down to 85, while Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Slaughter and May each offer 80.

Indeed, the only firms of any size offering more training contracts now than in the gold rush days of the mid-2000s are those that have merged.

The overriding message is that the major City and UK commercial law firms are employing more of their qualifiers, but they are taking on significantly fewer trainees to get that qualifying position.

Yet there are some signs that the firms may have miscalculated and cut back too far on training contract places.

Legal Cheek understands that several firms are currently in the market for newly-qualifying lawyers from rivals. Indeed, sources at one City law firm have told us that trainees at that practice will be rewarded with a £5,000 finder’s fee if they refer a newly-qualified solicitor who is subsequently taken on.

But balanced against that is more bad news. The rising use of non-qualified paralegals appears to continue apace. The managing partner at a top-20 English firm this week told Legal Cheek that the practice had doubled the number of paralegals it employs in the last two years.

Back to this spring’s retention round — which firms are above or below the average?

Three stand out as hitting the magic 100% retention rate, but two are US practices, which historically don’t take on as many trainees as their domestic City counterparts. They are Wall Street old boys White & Case and San Francisco-based Orrick, with 13 and four NQs, respectively. The English firm is Nabarro, which retained all 10 of its spring qualifiers.

Of the City players taking on significant numbers of trainees, some big names were above the retention average: A&O hit 93%, as did Anglo-Aussie player Herbert Smith Freehills. Linklaters, Clifford Chance, Ashurst and the London office of US firm Reed Smith clocked up 91%.

Thames Valley outfit Osborne Clarke retained 88%, while Anglo-German giant Freshfields was the final big player to come in above the average, clocking in at 85%.

Big names well below the average tidemark included King & Wood Mallesons (which recently took over London stalwart SJ Berwin). That firm retained just 67% of its qualifying solicitors.

Also, CMS Cameron McKenna held on to just 62% and Berwin Leighton Paisner 61%.

Commentators will be keeping an eye on these laggards in the next retention round in autumn. Improved results will add weight to the growing sense that the junior City law recruitment market is genuinely back in business.

But when extra bodies are needed across the board, will it be paralegals or qualified solicitors who are brought in to fill the gap?

Follow @JudgeJohnHack

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Welsh firm opts for fish and chip shop advert to haul in clients

Nelson Myatt solicitors has clearly formed a view of its target market — if nothing else, clients of the Llandudno Junction-based firm must have traditional culinary tastes, which is why the practice has launched an unusual advertising campaign promoting its services at a local chip shop.

Indeed, the firm has placed an advert slap bang in the middle of the chippy’s menu board.

The chip shop — or Archway Restaurant as it prefers to be called — is located in the neighbouring town of Conwy and serves what Legal Cheek understands to be a delicious range of fish, chips, pies — and now, by association, legal services.

Nelson Myatt is clearly excited by this new marketing adventure, tweeting earlier this week:

@archwayconwy loving the new sign, can't wait to see it, we'll be calling in for lunch just to have a look!

— NelsonMyatt (@NelsonMyatt) April 14, 2015

The high-street firm offers a wide selection of civil law advice, which is clearly listed if punters glance between the mains and the specials on the menu that is pictured above.

However, while the message of expertise in, amongst other things, conveyancing, personal injury and family law jumps out loud and clear, the innovative advertising campaign could create some baffling client testimonials, such as: “Professional at all times, and the cod was cooked to perfection”.

A spokeswoman for the firm told Legal Cheek:

“We are a forward-thinking, innovative and 21st century law firm. We are local solicitors and support our local community and local businesses as much as we can. Archways is one of the best establishments in the area to get great food … we like the ‘plaice’ and we really don’t take our advertising with ‘a pinch of salt’.”

The post Need legal advice? Would you like chips with that? appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Controversial Sun newspaper hack Katie Hopkins and her editor are in the line of fire as Society of Black Lawyers makes incitement to racial hatred complaint to police

A leading ethnic minority lawyer has reported firebrand Sun newspaper columnist Katie Hopkins to the police for allegedly inciting racial hatred.

The move by Society of Black Lawyers head, barrister Peter Herbert, came in response to a comment article earlier this week (pictured below) in which Hopkins referred to migrants crossing the Mediterranean for southern Europe as “cockroaches”.

According to an article in The Independent newspaper, Herbert has also cited the Sun’s editor, David Dinsmore, in his letter to London’s Metropolitan Police.

In his complaint (see below) — published in fully by the Indy — Herbert reminds Met Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe that for eight years until 2008 he was an independent member of the Metropolitan Police Authority.

Herbert’s complaint states:

“The recent comments by the Sun journalist Katie Hopkins, authorised for publication by her editor and senior staff, are sadly some of the most offensive, xenophobic and racist comments I have read in a British newspaper for some years.

“These comments comparing the African migrants fleeing Libya to ‘cockroaches’, almost certainly all ‘trafficked’ persons facing intimidation, violence and extortion at the point of departure represent some of the most vulnerable people in international law at the present time. Many will have legitimate claims for asylum under the 1951 Geneva Convention.”

The barrister is himself no stranger to controversy. Three years ago he stoked flames around top-tier football when he called for Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg to be suspended over alleged racist comments made to Chelsea’s Nigerian star John Obi Mikel. Chelsea later dropped the claim.

But Herbert wasn’t finished with the sport. Later that year he labelled the historically Jewish supporters of Tottenham Hotspur as “casual racists” for their fondness for the term “Yid Army”.

According to The Independent, Hopkins — who sprang to fame in 2007 as a contestant on the BBC reality programme The Apprentice — declined to comment on the complaint. In addition to the move by the Society of Black Lawyers, Hopkins is also facing an online petition — which has gathered some 200,000 signatures — for her to be sacked from the paper.

Meanwhile, The Sun released a statement saying it had “not received any communication from either the Met or the ICC”.

The post Top black lawyer charges columnist with racism over migrant “cockroach” slur appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Maybe don’t use these in a training contract application

As the fifth season of Game of Thrones gathers pace, we answer the question on the lips of every member of the legal profession: which Game of Thrones character is your law firm?

Joffrey Baratheon = Slaughter and May

Difficult to love, at times downright weird, but undeniably rich and powerful.

Eddard Stark = Allen & Overy’s Belfast office

Saw the writing on the wall a little too late.

Jaime Lannister = Clifford Chance

Well-meaning but constantly wrong-footed by events close to home.

Daenerys Targaryen = King & Wood Mallesons

Assembling international army to take over the world?

Khal Drogo = DLA Piper

Big, not that clever.

Jon Snow = Burges Salmon

Thriving beyond the M25 Wall.

Tyrion Lannister = Bindmans

Heart in the right place, constantly battling demons.

Stannis Baratheon = Ashurst

Destined to be forever silver circle.

Arya Stark = Slater & Gordon

Thriving amid the slips, trips and falls of an unforgiving world.

Ramsay Snow = Skadden

Torturing associates.

Margaery Tyrell = Irwin Mitchell

Climbing the ladder though innovative positioning.

Brienne of Tarth = Farrer & Co

Servants to the royal family.

Catelyn Stark = Berwin Leighton Paisner’s Lawyers On Demand Service

Not quite sure how it came to this.

Varys = CMS Cameron McKenna

Leads a network of mysterious overseas affiliates.

Cersei Lannister = Latham & Watkins

Not the most welcoming to visitors.

Robb Stark = Cobbetts

Looked the part, but really a boy in a man’s world.

Petyr Baelish = Schillings

Sinister but effective.

Theon Greyjoy = Halliwells

Disturbing demise.

Tywin Lannister = The bar of England & Wales

Too set in their ways to see that change was coming (OK, so the bar isn’t a law firm, but the resemblance was too strong to resist).

The post Which Game of Thrones character is your law firm? appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Latest UK death research shows the legal profession beats bankers and generals by being keenest to splurge its way into the afterlife

Fat cats in life; fat cats in death.

That’s the view of lawyers from a top-flight band of funeral directors, which claims that those in the legal profession insist on the priciest of send-offs, far outpacing bankers.

The burial and cremation merchants found that 15% of lawyers will spend more than the national average of £3,600 on a funeral.

Lawyers just pipped doctors and other health professionals, with 13% of that crowd coughing up more than the national average with their last breath.

Military personnel were in third place, followed by those in the financial services sector and then teachers.

The researchers found that 34% of dead professionals across the board had stated they wanted “to be remembered”, which doesn’t seem too much to ask for in the circumstances.

Another 29% wanted to put a “personal stamp” on their funerals (presumably insisting that those attending were kitted out in Elvis costumes, or, in the case of lawyers, as Court of Appeal judges).

“It is interesting to see just how many people seem to be spending more than the national average on funerals and, in particular, that those working in the legal sector end up having the most expensive final farewells,” commented Emma Simpson of Perfect Choice Funerals, adding:

“A funeral is often the time where an individual’s final impressions are aired to friends and family, so there are those who will want to spend a little more for a particular arrangement, especially the more unusual.”

She went on:

“However, these unusual or more quirky requests don’t have to break the bank and making a final farewell personal can be very simple. It’s all about choice and what is right for you and your circumstances.”

Wigs on coffins all round, then.

The post Who insists on the poshest funerals? Yep, it’s the lawyers appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Trainee solicitors, barristers and law lecturers distil their exam preparation wisdom into seven-second Vine clips (click on the bottom right corner of each image to turn on the sound)

Emma Reid, trainee solicitor at Herbert Smith Freehills

“Use examiners’ reports: they help you avoid common pitfalls when answering questions.”

Herbert Smith Freehills firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Stuart Harris, trainee solicitor at RPC

“Think outside your law textbooks. Practical examples from business, politics and economics show application of the law in context.”

RPC firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Anna Williams, employability consultant at the University of Law

“Visualise success, don’t panic — and maintain focus.”

Ed Wallis, trainee solicitor at Hogan Lovells

“Really try to engage in the material, form your own opinions and arguments, and then think carefully about how you can back these with case law and commentary.”

Hogan Lovells firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Jasmine Murphy, barrister at Hardwicke

“To remember case names and facts, recite them to yourself as part of your daily routine, while doing the washing-up for example.”

Hardwicke chambers profile [Legal Cheek]

Ishan Kolhatkar, barrister and lecturer at BPP Law School

“Write a question on the front of an index card, put the answer on the back, and you can test yourself wherever you are.”

Alice Harrison, trainee solicitor at Mayer Brown

“Do as many past or practice papers as you can, from start to finish, under timed conditions.”

Mayer Brown firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Wilf Odgers, trainee solicitor at Shearman & Sterling

“When remembering case names, try and make a story out of the names of the parties, and link it to what happened in the case.”

Shearman & Sterling firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Katie Harding, GDL and LPC tutor at Kaplan Law School

“Revise bit-size chunks of more than one topic in a day. That way your mind stays fresh and you get through all the material.”

Sophie O’Mahony, trainee solicitor at Norton Rose Fulbright

“Always consolidate your notes at the end of every tutorial.”

Norton Rose Fulbright firm profile [Legal Cheek]

Feeling the pain of law revision? Enjoy some distractions on our Facebook page.

The post 10 revision tips from people who have nailed law exams appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Controversial plea from the ex-chairwoman of Bar Standards Board is bound agitate current barrister and solicitor leaders

Legal executives should lead a “rebellion” against the last government’s legal aid cuts as well as compete with barristers for top judicial posts — implored the former chief bar regulator yesterday.

In a speech that will ruffle feathers at the Bar Council and the Law Society, Lady Deech — who was chairwoman of the Bar Standards Board for six years until the beginning of 2015 — told legal executives that they are “at the cutting edge” of the a multifaceted profession.

Deech — an academic, who read law at St Anne’s College, Oxford — called on legal executives to challenge the two traditional branches of the legal profession for top slots on the bench.

“If chartered legal executives continue the progress they have so strikingly made in the last decades,” she told a meeting of the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx), “you may be the ones rising to the judiciary and keeping it representative of the population.”

A leading barrister member of the bench backed Deech’s views. High Court judge Nicola Davies called on legal executives to apply for judicial appointments:

“I would like to offer my thanks to CILEx for the work they have done in supporting the judiciary in … our quest for greater diversity. CILEx has been a real force for good …”

Deech went on to tell the legal executives that they “are at the cutting edge of an ancient and proud profession”. The former regulator cited CILEx’s emphasis on diversity as crucial.

“You represent social mobility because of your different backgrounds and non-traditional entries into the profession,” she said. “All of this diversity amounts to the raising of the flag of rebellion to the Lord Chancellor. His cuts might have had the effect of deterring many graduates from taking on family and criminal work, because there is no legal aid and no way to earn a modest living in order to pay off their student debt.”

The post Former watchdog tells legal execs to battle traditional lawyers for top judicial posts appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Lawyer and historian go hammer and tongs, while Twittersphere lambasts Law Society for dropping definite article clanger regarding the 800-year-old document

A cat fight broke out this morning between two powerful camps in British society — luvvie lawyers v luvvie historians — as they scrapped over the crucial issue of the legacy of Magna Carta.

In the red corner was Helena Kennedy QC of London’s Doughty Street Chambers, or more formally, Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws; in the blue corner was television’s David Starkey, Britain’s self-anointed greatest historian.

The crux of the high-octane row on Radio 4’s Today Programme was whether lawyers make too much of a meal over the lasting value of that 13th century document. In short, Starkey reckons they do with knobs on; Kennedy is pretty firm that they don’t.

Through the miracle of modern technology, Legal Cheek readers can decide for themselves thanks to the audio extracts of the tussle published here. Highlights include Kennedy allowing herself to be described — tongue partially in cheek — as a “great lawyer”, and Starkey berating her with the term “lawyer myths”.

‘Are you a lawyer? Is accuracy being pedantic?’

‘Juries did not exist in 1215 — It’s a lawyer myth’

The telly historian reckons that the legal profession has over-promoted the 1215 document, suggesting that the real anniversary celebrations should come in 10 years’ time. For Starkey it is the 1225 iteration of Magna Carta that carries more lasting oomph.

‘Helena, let’s correct fact, I am the historian … and I’m a great historian’

The Kennedy-Starkey dust-up falls against another row over the 800-year-old piece of paper. Twitter was ablaze late last week and earlier this over suggestions that the Law Society had dropped a grammatical clanger.

The body representing solicitors in England and Wales was hauled over the coals for the setting of its annual human rights essay question, which went like this:

“The roots of many of our basic rights go back to the Magna Carta whose 800th anniversary is being celebrated in 2015. Given this important legacy, to what extent would proposals to repeal the Human Rights Act 1998 and pull out of the European Convention on Human Rights impact on the protection of human rights in the UK and around the world?”

Pedants have crawled from every inch of social media woodwork to cry foul over the use of the definite article immediately preceding Magna Carta.

As all those that managed to stay awake during Latin lessons will recall, that language is a bit shaky on definite and indefinite articles. So technically — and let’s face it, the law ain’t nothing it ain’t about technicalities — references to the great document should simply be “Magna Carta”.

And before the Legal Cheek comments section lights up like a Metropolitan Police van headed back to the station at teatime, we put our hands up. In common with hundreds of Fleet Street and specialist hacks up and down the country, we’ve shoved a definite article in front of Magna Carta on several occasions.

For the record, Ian McDonald, a fourth-year LLB student at Birkbeck College, University of London, bagged the Law Society essay prize.

And finally, to close down this Magna Carta update, the Twittersphere’s ubiquitous legal commentator and blogger David Allen Green wheeled out his Jack of Kent alter-ego to bemoan the fact that every time he attempts to have a serious social media discussion about the document, jokers raise Tony Hancock’s famous question: “Did she die in vain?”

For those too young to have heard of Hancock or have any idea of his “Half Hour”, then check out this link to the great comedian’s version of “Twelve Angry Men”.

Enough Magna Carta, now, cries the editor. She’s dead to us.

Listen to the heated debate in full (it’s at 2:20) here.

The post Kennedy QC v Starkey in almighty Magna Carta bust up on this morning’s BBC radio appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Light blues outstrip ancient rivals Oxford by £7,000, while LSE comes second and even the Scots get a look in

It’s not meant to be all about the money, but just in case it is, then prospective law students should beg, borrow and steal to get places at Cambridge — as that university’s graduates are the biggest earners in the legal profession.

Research released yesterday shows that lawyers of five to 10 years’ post-qualification experience with Cambridge law degrees top the cash league table in the UK.

The light blues rake in average annual pay of £99,000, with law graduates from the London School of Economics trailing in second place on an average whack of £94,000.

Moneybags top four

According to the researchers — Emolument.com, a bonus and salary benchmarking website focusing on the professional services sector — law graduates from Edinburgh and Oxford universities round out the moneybags top four, earning average annual whacks of £93,000 and £92,000 respectively.

Average wages on qualification and up to five years’ post-qualification experience (PQE) across the board in the legal profession came in at £54,000 annually. That figure will make many legal aid practitioners wince with resentment — and possibly trigger a degree of scepticism over the research.

The Emolument team said it surveyed nearly 400 “legal professionals” in the UK, without specifying practice areas. The Law Society — in its long running campaign against the tabloid press image of fat cat lawyers — has routinely maintained that average earnings across the solicitors’ profession stand at between £40,000 to £50,000.

Intense pressure

Arguably, the Emolument research could relate to commercial lawyers, but the survey is not clear. In any event, it claims that by the time UK lawyers have racked up 15 years’ experience they are on average raking in £181,000 annually.

In a slightly bizarre comment, Emolument chief executive Thomas Drewry said:

“Not only do lawyers commit to long years of studying but it appears they do not reap the financial rewards early in their careers either. With long hours and intense pressure, it is definitely a career for the committed.”

With the average UK annual national wage standing at £26,500, many would be quite keen on that £54k.

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University of Adelaide today takes its specialist module to the launch pad warning of fears that it’s not that lonely in space after all

Space used to be the final frontier — but now even law schools are boldly going into the cold black depths of the galaxy.

The latest is the University of Adelaide in South Australia, which today followed the unlikely trailblazer of Sunderland University’s law school into a world of zero gravity populated by chaps with pointy ears.

The Aussies have launched strategic space law, which they describe as being an “intensive” post-graduate course that will “bring the legal profession up to speed” with all things Wookiee related.

Warp speed

But Adelaide Uni is about five years behind in the law school space race, as in 2010 England’s own Sunderland University went to the launch pad and shot off a space law element to its law degree.

Undeterred by that head start — which, if one were travelling at warp speed would provide Sunderland with a very long lead over its rivals — the Australians are talking big.

“The commercialisation of space activity is a pressing issue,” explained Adelaide law school’s Professor Melissa de Zwart. “As new players … come in to the space technology field, that’s a really exciting opportunity because of the new ideas and new technologies, but it creates problems too, because people have to learn how to operate in that zone.”

Fellow Adelaide law school professor Dale Stephens also highlighted the weaponising of space.

“Military uses of space are expanding,” he explained, “especially in the context of weapons capability and satellite use. This is a largely unregulated area and there exist real conceptual and practical questions about how laws designed to regulate military operations on earth can apply in space.”

Crowded exosphere

The Australians are currently working with a consortium of universities in Canada and the US on the legal ramifications of space.

Another issue, according to the space-suited academics, is that it has become much easier for anyone with a rocket to launch stuff beyond the exosphere, which any boffin know is just about the last atmospheric layer above earth.

“Space is becoming more crowded,” said de Zwart, “and we have to start regulating it because there’s going to be more space junk and less orbit to operate in.”

Indeed, many lawyers would be keen to launch the current watchdogs — the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Bar Standards Board — as far into space as Richard Branson could take them.

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A recent rash of online efforts from the legal profession should be praised for effort, but they won’t reach their supposed target audiences

They are bright, breezy, colourful and chock-a-block with state-of-the-art design tropes. They are a rash of lawyer-generated “project” and other websites — with the latest to hit the cyber streets being Rightsinfo.org.

It is the brainchild of Adam Wagner, an eight-year-call barrister at London’s One Crown Office Row. According to the public law specialist, the site will “use social media to improve public understanding of human rights. Our brilliant new website provides clear, reliable and beautiful human rights information to share”.

Wagner’s well-meaning site comes on the heels of The Transparency Project, a curiously-named site from fellow barrister Lucy Reed, a family law specialist at St John’s Chambers in Lincoln’s Inn.

The “concept” behind Reed’s site “is to shed some light on the workings of the family courts, to make the process and the cases understandable for people without law degrees”.

In a slightly different game is Mootis, a lawyer-specific social media site launched by Bill Braithwaite QC of north of England set Exchange Chambers. His site comes with high ambitions, setting out to be the Twitter of the legal profession, without that site’s key element of a 140-character limit.

All of these efforts are interesting. But are they anything more than lawyers talking to themselves? Indeed, are they anything more than vanity publishing?

No.

Everyone loves human rights in principle, just as everyone in philosophical mode recognises that family law proceedings should be a lot more collaborative and less stressful, not least for the children involved.

But in the real world of tabloid newspapers and radio shock-jocks, human rights is little more than shorthand for paedophiles, prisoners, benefit scroungers and illegal immigrants.

That is a grim fact of life that few if any in the human rights campaigning community appreciate.

Of course they are fully aware that evil Fleet Street reptiles and commercial radio chat merchants cravenly misrepresent human rights issues for the sole purpose of inflaming their readers and listeners. But what they don’t appear to understand is that many of those readers and listeners are themselves keen to be inflamed.

And unfortunately, those poor bedraggled members of the public that actually might be keen to benefit from their human rights are too focused on living hard and stressful lives to search the internet for a jolly and beautiful website that will explain the concepts.

Harsh reality

The harsh reality is this: immigrants facing deportation, prisoners trying to access information, parents or grandparents struggling to win access to their children or grandchildren don’t have the time — and sadly in many cases, the intellectual capacity — to trawl through a website.

Likewise, a woman suffering regular beatings from her husband or partner is not going to be hugely impressed by a 40-minute podcast meandering through the finer points of family law issues.

What those people need is a fully-funded legal aid system that pays specialists lawyers to explain the issues face-to-face and then to do all the heavy lifting that accessing justice requires. And that system needs to be promoted and advertised in simple language in places the masses see — railway stations, the sides of buses, even on commercial television. And the message would need to be easily digestible, probably avoiding the metro-elite term “human rights”.

It’s simple. If Britain wants a national legal service — and there are hugely strong economic as well as moral arguments in favour of one — then as a society the country has to pay for the whole shooting match.

The fact that the most recent coalition government–– and to be fair, its New Labour predecessor — viewed legal aid as a nuisance at best and hindrance at worst, doesn’t make the simplicity of the argument any less stark. And indeed, any deflection from that core could be viewed as a diversion helpful to the very politicians aiming to slash budgets and ditch the Human Rights Act.

Politicians view legal aid as an easy target because they are convinced that access to justice is a high concept to which most voters don’t wish to allocate brain time.

The sad point is that the politicians might well be right. Many socially progressive lawyers are convinced that the public would rally behind the access to justice cause if it were just made clear to them in language they can understand.

As worthy as the recent rash of websites is, the public isn’t going to find them and the sites probably wouldn’t mean much to them if they did. Lawyers are beautifully and colourfully talking to themselves.

Oh, and what of Mootis? The last time Legal Cheek checked the site was down.

Follow @JudgeJohnHack

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Slaughter and May pop star associate puts her firm in social media shadows with latest catchy release

Slaughter and May associate Serena Kern could teach the firm’s marketing department (such as it is) a thing or two — the lawyer-turned-pop-star has amassed a loyal following of more than 57,000 on Facebook alone.

Kern — who’s been an associate at S&M since 2013 — hasn’t let the crippling hours of corporate law stand in the way of her pop career. According to music hosting site SoundCloud, she has produced 13 tracks including “Better To Have Loved”, “My Promise” and rather appropriately for those in corporate law “When I Cry”.

Her latest release to keep fans satisfied is “Dream” (embedded below), featuring London-based Asian music and Bollywood specialist producer Rishi Rich.

Law firm envy

The Swiss-Indian songwriter, who studied law at the London School of Economics in 2007 before going on to do the Legal Practice Course at BPP, has developed a social media presence that is sure to be the envy of any law firm — apart from her own, which has a history of not giving a monkey’s.

Facebook groupies aside — and even with just 173 followers on Twitter — Kern easily beats Slaughter’s tally. The firm’s Twitter following languishes on a big fat zero, despite the magic circle practice joining the site back in 2009. This is because the partners opted to protected their account and ignore all follow requests.

Dozy marketing team

Meanwhile, the Slaughter and May Facebook presence is somewhat better, with a following of 2,688 — but that’s still 54,000 behind its stardust associate.

It’s not clear whether Kern wishes to pursue a music career full time. But if she does decided to leave S&M, Legal Cheek suggests that she wakes up the marketing team on the way out.

Watch the preview of Kern’s latest track, ‘Dream’, below:

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Tory safe seat man in bid to refute allegations that his claim to have headed a magic circle department is a big fat exaggeration

A solicitor and Conservative Party parliamentary candidate is battling to fight off allegations that he falsely claimed to have been a department head at a magic circle practice.

Media reports today suggested that Alan Mak — the general election candidate in the safe Tory constituency of Havant in Hampshire — inaccurately boasted on his CV that he was a “department head” at global practice Clifford Chance.

On his leaked CV (pictured below) — which was first picked up by website Political Scrapbook — Mak described CC as the “world’s biggest law firm”, where he had been a department head. He also claimed that he had been awarded the title of “young City lawyer of the year” before the age of 30.

Reports have maintained that Mak was never promoted to Clifford Chance’s partnership. And as an associate he was never in charge of a department or practice group.

But Mak has told Legal Cheek exclusively that he spent seven years at the firm during which time he was in a crucial mid-tier management position.

“My roles at the firm included heading up the UK department of a Europe-wide practice group,” he said, “which I made clear during the selection process for Havant. Not all local departments are run by partners, and my successor in that role now is also not a partner. I have never claimed to be a partner of Clifford Chance or any other law firm.”

Mak went on to say he was “a founding member” of the Clifford Chance Foundation, a pro bono initiative launched in 2008.

“My work included assessing applications for grants,” he said.

Mak — who read law at Cambridge — was admitted as a solicitor in February 2009. According to Law Society records, he specialised in financial services, mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance, banking and general commercial work.

His CV also stated that Mak was “used to dealing with ministers, civil servants, and speaking up for others”.

Mak rallied support from local Tory activists in his defence. Havant Conservative Party chairman Mike Fairhurst went into bat, saying:

“Nobody in the constituency party ever assumed that Alan was, or had been, a partner at any law firm. He has never claimed to be a partner, and his CV does not imply that. If he had been a partner, I am sure he would have said so clearly. He was selected on his all-round ability, and we are very happy that he is our candidate.”

Clifford Chance declined to comment on any aspect of Mak’s former employment with the firm.

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Timid approach from representation bodies should be binned, advises Sir Anthony Hooper, in bid to put fire in belly of criminal law practitioners

A retired Court of Appeal judge has implored legal aid lawyers to ignore overly cautious professional bodies and launch a “revolution” of wide-spread strikes to battle budget cuts.

Sir Anthony Hooper QC told a rally in London yesterday that if the Conservatives were returned to power in the general election, it would be “time for a revolution”.

Crime specialist legal aid lawyers were rallying at Westminster Central Hall in London in the latest round of protests against the last government’s swathe of cuts to legal aid funding.

Too timid

Sir Anthony — a former chairman of the Inns of Court School of Law (now City Law School), who sat on the Appeal Court bench from 2004 to 2012 — told solicitors and barristers that they should ignore the diplomatic inclinations of their representative bodies.

The former judge specifically accused the Law Society, Bar Council and even the Criminal Bar Association of being too timid in their objections to the reforms triggered by former Justice Secretary Chris Grayling.

Meanwhile, Laura Janes, the chair of the Young Legal Aid Lawyers and a crime and prison law specialist solicitor at London law firm Scott-Moncrieff, told a separate meeting:

“Ten years ago, I would not have believed any government would make massive cuts to the remit of services on top of funding cuts. Changes to the scope of legal aid have left vulnerable people completely cut off from certain parts of the law.”

Demeaning equality

Janes was speaking at an event marking the 10th anniversary of the group. Flagging up the forthcoming general election, she went on to say:

“The question we must ask ourselves … as we prepare to cast our votes on 7 May, is how much do we value justice?

“We must make sure that the politicians we elect do not demean the notions of equality, fairness and justice by preventing people from accessing the courts.”

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Will the intellectual property law teams at two supermarket giants leap into their panda cars to clamp down on these cheeky independents?

What is it about Tesco — once the poster boy of UK retail, now the limping invalid — that attracts so much passing off or attempted passing off?

Perhaps it’s that homespun “everyday value” catchphrase, but local shopkeepers around the country are keen to bag a bit of reflected glory — even if in the process they have to sail close to the intellectual property wind.

Recently, Legal Cheek highlighted “Tesos Express” in southwest London. Today we bring you “Today’s Extra” from Hackney in east London and — as a bit of a readers’ bonus — “Singhbury’s” in the Wirral town of Wallasey.

We are reliably informed by Legal Cheek’s reserve of IP specialists that neither of these local grocers is likely to be troubled by an army of supermarket in-house lawyers.

“Nobody could be seriously confused here,” commented one. “Nor do the signs taint the Tesco or Sainsbury’s trademarks. So the store owners may well be in the clear.”

Others might suggest that Tesco’s legal team will have so much else on its plate that chucking cease and desist letters around the country’s high streets is not a priority.

Not only has the supermarket giant just announced its worst financial results since Noah popped into his local branch for several hundredweight of animal feed, it is facing high-profile legal actions.

The first relates to the senior team’s acknowledgement that the company overstated last year’s profits. And last week the Bloomberg news agency reported that the business faces possible legal action after allegedly conducting disciplinary hearings — which in some cases led to sackings — via email.

PREVIOUSLY:

Yet another copyright infringement has surfaced on Twitter [Legal Cheek]

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Tough conditions for wannabe solicitors continue — as stats show London tightens grip on training contract market

Law firm training contracts have nosedived by nearly 12.5% over the last decade, as Law Society figures released earlier today dramatically illustrated the tightening job market for wannabe solicitors.

There were 5,001 contracts on offer in 2013-14, according to the society’s annual statistical report, a drop of 5.6% on the previous year and about 12.4% on the 2003-04 figure of 5,708.

City dominance

More than a third of the contracts currently on the market are at large corporate or City law firms. Searching for a training contract outside London at a high street firm will present students with an almost impossible challenge in some parts of the country.

The pool of trainee solicitors has continued its feminisation, with the number of women trainees at law firms 9 percentage points above that of their male counterparts.

According to the figures, about 36% of all training contracts were offered in the City, with another nearly 19% provided throughout the rest of the capital.

The best chances of bagging a provincial training contract came in the north-west, where slightly more than 11% of all training contracts were available. That was followed by the south-east on 7%.

Trainee deserts

The north-east was the driest of training contract deserts, providing only marginally more than 2% of those available throughout England and Wales.

But that region was followed closely by Wales, with only 2.6% of available training contracts and the East Midlands with only 3%.

Private practice law firms continued to be far and away the main providers of solicitor training, as they accounted for slightly more than 93% of contracts. In-house legal departments at corporations offered 3.7% of contracts, while local and central government produced 1.5% and 0.7%, respectively.

Women are increasingly dominating the law firm trainee demographic.

The figures show that 58% of the total trainee solicitor pool last year were women, of whom 56% were in private practice. In contrast, of the 42% of trainees that were men across England and Wales, 37% were at law firms.

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