Legal Profession in England13

8/11/2019 Legal Profession in England13

1/99

THE LEGAL PROFESSION

IN ENGLANDUnit 6


2/99

What can lawyers do for their

clients?


3/99

Preview

Branches of the legal profession

Solicitors: type of work

Solicitors professional organisation

Solicitors training

Barristers: type of work

Barristers professional organisation

Barristers training

Advantages and disadvantages of a split profession

Historical overview

Legal terms


4/99

Branches of the legal profession

Solicitors

Barristers


5/99

Solicitors

Provide members of the publictheirclientswith skilled advice andrepresentation in all legal matters


6/99

Instructions

Anyone who needs legal advice or havelegal work done will go to a solicitorsoffice and tell them what he requiresthis is called giving a solicitorinstructions


7/99

Solicitors

Work on their own, or as partners withother solicitors

A solicitors practice: firm of solicitors


8/99

Type of work

Litigation: preparing cases to be tried inthe civil or criminal courts

Commercial: legal advice in the field ofbusiness, drawing up contracts

Conveyancing: making all the legalarrangements for the buying and selling ofland, houses, etc.


9/99

Type of work

Employment: assisting employees andemployers in cases involving allegations ofunfair dismissal, or claims for redundancy

payments

Family: divorce, child care


10/99

Type of work

Immigration: representing foreignnationals, or those without any nationalstatus, who are claiming asylum, or

permission to stay or work

Licencing: arranging to apply for licences

Probate: making wills for clients andmaking sure their wishes are carried out


11/99

Type of work

At one time, most solicitorsgeneralpractitioners who would refer to experts inparticular fields of law

family solicitor

Today: many solicitors specialise in onlyone or two fields of law


12/99

Type of work

Legal advisors

Also: provide detailed records of a case


13/99

Type of work

The public comes into contact withsolicitors more than any other people whowork in the law; this gives them a unique

insight into how decisions of the courtsare made


14/99


15/99

Records

Solicitors must create or organise a recordof what happens in a case, so that thecase may be understood by barristers and

judges


16/99

Records

The recording process starts when thesolicitor first meets the client

Solicitor provides the client withinformation about what can and cannot bedone, and how much it will cost


17/99

Records

Keeping note of all important meetingsand telephone conversations relating tothe case

Organising all case documents (essentialwhen handling clients property andmoney)


18/99

Family or High Street Solicitor

on call to deal with almost every aspectof legal life

Individual clients (crime, personal injuryclaims, family matters, employment andsocial security problems)

Other clients: estate agents, bankmanagers, accountants


19/99

Representation

Solicitors often appear in court asadvocates, pleading the causes of theirclients

Solicitors present cases in the lowercourts: magistrates courts and the countycourts


20/99

Solicitor advocates

Allowed to appear in the Crown Court andHigh Court


21/99

Solicitors and barristers

Solicitors have direct contact with theirclients, barristers do not

The solicitors relationship with a client more personal


22/99

Solicitors and barristers

A client who needs the services of abarrister must go first to a solicitor, whowill instruct, or brief the barrister

The solicitor will choose the barrister whois right for the case, and help prepare thecase for court


23/99

The Law Society

The professional body that governs thesolicitors branch of the legal profession

Responsible for the training of solicitors


24/99

The Law Society

Solicitors -admitted to the Rolls, whichmeans their names will be entered on theroll (list) of solicitors permitted to practise

They must have a practising certificateissued by the Law Society

Cc. 97,300 solicitors


25/99

The Law Society

Makes rules as to how solicitors shouldlook after their clients

Carries out spot-checks and audits

Disciplinary powers


26/99

Training

A law degreenot essential

A student who does not graduate in lawtakes a conversion course conversioncourse, also called the Graduate Diplomain Law (GDL/CPE)

1 year (full time) or 2 years (part-time)


27/99

Training of solicitors

Legal Practice Course (LPC), orPostgraduate Diploma in Legal Practice :1 year (full course) or 2 years (part-time);

aim: to equip trainee solicitors with theknowledge and skills to work in asolicitors office;

course-work, practical skills, writtenexaminations


28/99

Training

Training contracts involve work in asolicitors office

Trainees handle their own cases, seeclients, and carry out the responsibilitiesof a solicitor under supervision;


29/99

Training

Professional skills course: subjects such asaccounting, professional conduct, advocacy

Compulsory modules: Criminal Litigation,

Business Law and Practice, Property Law andPractice, and Civil litigation

Elective modules: personal injury, family law,employment law, housing law, immigration law,probate, commercial law, welfare law andcommercial property law


30/99

Barristers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Advokat,_Engelsk_advokatdr%C3%A4kt,_Nordisk_familjebok.png


31/99

Barristers

Barrister-at-Law; also known as counsel


32/99

Barristers

When they qualify they are called to theBar

dates from the days when each courtroomwas fitted with a bar dividing the areaused by the court from the general public.Only barristers were allowed to step up to

the bar to plead their clients cases


33/99

Barristers

Litigation or courtroom lawyers whoactually conduct cases in court

Rights of audience(rights to appear) inany court (Crown Court, Hight Court,courts of appeal)


34/99


35/99

Barristers

Clients who need to go to court cannotsee a barrister directly;

they can only arrange to be representedby a barrister or to take his advice by firstgoing to a solicitor;

the solicitor will then instructor brief the

barrister to help the client


36/99

Barristers

Unlike solicitors, barristers cannot work inpartnerships

Self-employed

In-house lawyers


37/99

Barristers

Share offices known as barristerschambers, and have their work organisedby the same manager, who is called a

barristers clerk


38/99

Barristers clerk

Arranges court appearances and meetingsbetween clients, solicitors, and barristers(conferences)

Negotiates barristers fees


39/99

Inns of Court

Grays Inn (1370)

Lincolns Inn (1422)

Inner Temple (1440) Middle Temple (1404)


40/99

Grays Inn


41/99

Inns of Court

In order to become a barrister, studentsmust pass all the necessary law exams;

they must also attendqualifying sessionswhich includedining in Hall and othereducational activities


42/99

Dining in Hall

Eating a number of dinners in the GreatHall of an Inn of Court

Dates from the days when studentsreceived their legal education by attendinglectures which were given while they weredining in Hall


43/99

Inns of Court

Each Inn has its own hall, common rooms,library, and church

It is run by a number of Masters of theBench, or benchers (senior barristers and

judges who belong to the Inn, who areelected to govern it)


44/99

Inns of Court

For centuries, the training institutions andprofessional societies for barristers


45/99


46/99

Queens Counsel

After some years of experience, a juniorcounsel who produces work of a highstandard, may be appointed by the Lord

Chancellor to be One of Her MajestysCounsel Learned in the Law : QueensCounsel (QC)

Becoming a QC: taking silk


47/99

Barristers

2004: 14,364 practising barristers inEngland and Wales, of whom 1,239 QCs


48/99

Type of work

Advocacywork in court

The art of advocacythe art ofpersuasion


49/99

Principles of advocacy

A practising barrister must promote andprotect fearlessly and by all proper andlawful means his clients best interests

without regard to his own interests or toany consequences to himself or to anyother person (Barristers Code of Conduct)


50/99

Training

Academic qualifications, practical training

Attending the Bar Professional TrainingCourse: one year full time or two years

part time

BPTC aims to give students the skillsand required for a career at the Bar:

advocacy, role-playing, exercises indrafting legal documents and writingopinions.


51/99

Course content

Case work skills: Case preparation, Legal research

Written Skills:Opinion-writing (giving written advice oncases), Drafting (writing various types of documentsrequired for litigation)

Interpersonal skills: Conference skills (interviewingclients), Negotiation, Advocacy (court or tribunalappearances)

Legal knowledge: Civil litigation and remedies,

Criminal litigation and sentencing, Evidence, Professionalethics


52/99

Pupillage

Apprenticeship with an experiencedbarrister in a set of barristers chambers

6 months with one pupil master and 6with another, in order to gain a widerexperience


53/99

Pupillage

During the first six months a youngbarrister is not allowed to appear in courton his own

During the second six months he may doso in appropriate cases (less seriouscases)


54/99


55/99

Tenancy

If accepted, the new tenant will use thechambers as a base, and will be clerkedfrom them

Tenants have to make a contributiontowards the expenses of running thechambers


56/99

Bar Council

The governing body for barristers

Issues a code of conduct to which allbarristers are obliged to adhere

Regulates activities of barristers,

maintains standards within the Bar

Considers complaints against barristers


57/99


58/99


59/99

Disadvantages

A multiplicity of legal advisers leads to higher costs

As barristers are dependent upon solicitors for referralsof work, it is open to questionhow willing barristers areto criticise those who instruct them to the client.

Barristers are sometimes criticised for being "over-specialised" and not having sufficient general expertiseoutside of what can be highly specialised fields.

Historical development:


60/99

Historical development:

The emergence of barristers

England saw the very early emergence ofa centralised system of justice within theRoyal Court

Common law courts supplanted localcourts

A legal profession operating in the central

courts13th century

Factors facilitating the development


61/99

Factors facilitating the development

of the legal profession

The language of the courtNormanFrench

Geographyimpossible to make all the

necessary journeys from a litigants localestates to the Royal Court

Litigants required persons who couldspeak for them in court and attorneys forprocedural purposes who could act ontheir behalf in their absence


62/99

Emergence of barristers

In late 13th c. The Common Bench judgesdecided who they would permit to appearas advocatesthese persons began to

form an elite which stood apart from otherlegal practitioners

14th c. they organised into a guild knownas order of serjeants at law

Admission to the guildconducted by thejudges of the Common Bench


63/99

Education of barristers

13th c.legal education available; textsof lectures and disputations survive

1280s students referred to as apprentices

of the bench 14th c. apprentices began to live around

the area of the four Inns of Court

15th c. The Inns of Courtcollegiateestablishments (the Third University ofEngland)


64/99

The emergence of solicitors

15th c. solicitorspersons who helpedclients through the legal labyrinth,instructing counsel on their behalf

In 16th c. solicitors were young barristers

Sufficient advocacy work to occupy theBar, leaving preliminary interviews with

clients and procedural matters to solicitors


65/99

Further Developments

17th c.division of responsibility betweensolicitor and barrister

Rules preventing barristers fromundertaking the work of solicitors andexcluding solicitors from the Inns of Court


66/99

Status of solicitors

17th and 18th c. status of solicitorsincreasedlegal advisors of the wealthy

1804 conveyancing monopoly

19th c. probate, divorce and Admiraltywork

Rights of audience in County Courts (setup in 1846)


67/99

Training: summary

Solicitors Barristers

Degree, if not in law then a GraduateDiploma in Law/Common Professional Examination

Legal Practice Course Bar Professional Training Course

Training contract Pupillage


68/99

Role: Summary


Private practice in solicitorsfirm Self-employed in chambers

Wide variety of work Mostly court work

Contracts, wills, conveyancing Also write opinions and draftdocuments

Direct access by clients Direct access limited to otherprofessions, e.g. accountants


69/99

Advocacy rights: summary


Advocacy certificate Full rights


70/99

Supervision


Law Society Bar Council


71/99

Legal terms

Barrister

odvjetnik s pravom zastupanja pred svimsudovima

Solicitor

odvjetnik s pravom zastupanja pred niimsudovima


72/99

Legal terms

Instructions

Details of the case given by a client to asolicitor, or by a solicitor to a barrister


73/99

Legal terms

ClientA person who pays for a service carried

out by a professional person such as a

solicitorA person who employs a solicitor to carry

out legal business on his behalf; asolicitors client cannot consult a barristerdirectly but only through his solicitor; thesolicitor is therefore the barristers client


74/99

Legal terms

Estate: all the property that is owned by a person,

especially a person who has recently died

Ostavinska masa, ostavina Conveyancing:

drawing up a document which legally

transfers property from a seller to a buyer Sastavljanje dokumenta o prijenosu

vlasnitva


75/99

Legal terms

Brief:

details of a clients case, prepared by asolicitor and given to the barrister who is

going to argue the case in court

To brief a barrister

to give a barrister all the details of the

case which he will argue in court


76/99

Legal terms

Defamation: act of injuring someones reputation by

maliciously saying or writing things about

them Negligence:

the tort of acting carelessly towards others

so as to cause harm, entitling the injuredparty to claim damages

Nehaj, nemar


77/99

Legal terms

To sue:

to start legal proceedings againstsomeone to get compensation for a wrong

Damages:

money claimed by a claimant from adefendant as compensation for harm done

Liable:

legally responsible for something


78/99

Legal terms

Pleadings:

documents setting out the claim of theclaimant or the defence of the defendant,

or giving the arguments which the twosides will use in proceedings

Iskazi parnikih stranaka, podnesci u

graanskom postupku

E i L l f i l


79/99

Exercise: Legal professionals

Below is a list of tasks carried out by solicitorsand barristers. Classify them:

advising clients on general legal issues, advisingclients on specialist legal issues, advising on

litigation, advising on tax matters, advocacy inall courts, advocacy in lower courts, commercialwork, conveyancing of houses, dealing withcommercial transactions, drafting of documents

in connection with litigation, making wills,preparing cases, share and other propertydealings

S li it


80/99

Solicitors

Advising clients on general legal issues Advising on tax matters

Advocacy in lower courts

Commercial work Conveyancing of houses

Dealing with commercial transactions

Making wills

Preparing cases

Share and other property dealings

B i t


81/99

Barristers

Advocacy in all courts

Advising clients on specialist legal issues

Advising on litigation

Drafting of documents in connection withlitigation

E i 2 L l t i i


82/99

Exercise 2: Legal training

Legal training for solicitors (who providegeneral legal advice to clients) andbarristers (who present cases in the upper

courts) is different. The following textsdescribe the stages in legal training, butthey are mixed up. Put the steps into the

correct category (Training forsolicitors/Training for barristers) andorder:

E i 2


83/99

Exercise 2

1. PRACTICE AND CONTINUING EDUCATION The next stage is to obtrain a tenancy:

becoming an assistant to a practising barrister. 2. GETTING THE QUALIFICATIONS The next step is to acquire some legal traiing

specific to the work of a barrister. 3. DEVELOPING PRACTICAL SKILLS Next the intending solicitor has to enter a two-

year training contract with a firm of solicitors togain practical experience in a variety of areas oflaw.

E i 2


84/99

Exercise 2

4. GETTING THE TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE:PUPILLAGE

This is the apprenticeship served by traineebarristers, who are known as pupils. It usually

takes a year and consists of a mixture ofassisting and observing experienced barristers,as well as more practical experience.

5. GETTING THE ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS The quickest and most common route to

qualification is by means of a qualifying lawdegree.

E i 2


85/99

Exercise 2

6. GETTING THE VOCATIONALQUALIFICATIONS

You will have to undertake the Legal PracticeCourse, which is the professional training for

solicitors. The course teaches the practicalapplication of the law to the needs of clients.

7. GETTING THE ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS

The first part of training to become a barrister isknown as the academic stage, which provides ageneral theoretical introduction to the law.

E i 2


86/99

Exercise 2

Training for solicitors

5, 6, 3

Training for barristers

7, 2, 4, 1

E i 3


87/99

Exercise 3

VERB NOUN NOUN -PERSON

0 partner

trainee

advise

practice

specialise

E i 4


88/99

Exercise 4

Match the two parts of the definitions: 1. Someone who works for his or herself is 2. If you speak on behalf of clients in court, you 3. Non-professional clients are known as 4. Barristers working solely for a company are

called 5. The governing authorities of barristers are 6. When a solicitor gives a barrister the details

of a case, the barrister is 7. When you work as a barrister you

E i 4


89/99

Exercise 4

A) provide representation

B) lay clients

C) Self-employed/ a sole trader

D) instructed

E) in-house counsel

F) practise at the Bar G) the Bar Council and the Inns of Court


90/99


91/99

advocacy, Bar Vocational Course, chambers, conversion course,

d t/ l di / i i i i ht f di ill il


92/99

document/pleading/opinion, exercise rights of audience, pupillage, pupil

master, senior barrister, shadow

I took a first degree in Modern History, then didthe ____ ____ in law at City University, whichwas much harder. I then did the ____ _____

_____ at the Inns of Court School of Law.

Most days Id expect to be present in ____fromabout 8.45 am to 7.00pm, working almostthroughout in my____ _____s room. During

that time I ____his professional life completely.




93/99



I generally look at papers when they first comein. Im expected to be able to suggest how thecase might be approached. In a week I mightdraft a___, prepare notes for a conference withclients, comment on draft witness statements,and research legal points.

Although all ___ are for twelve months, if they

think you have no prospect of finding a ____inthe chambers, after six months you would betold discreetly.




94/99



Chambers runs ___training evenings toreduce the loss of opportunity to ____

____ _____ _____ in court.

When Ive prectised for more than tenyears, Id be interested in being appointedas a _____ ______, with a specialist area

such as employment law.

Key


95/99

Key

I took a first degree in Modern History,then did the conversion coursein law atCity University, which was much harder. I

then did the Bar Vocational Courseatthe Inns of Court Schoold of Law. Mostdays Id expect to be present inchambersfrom about 8.45 am to

7.00pm, working almost throughout in mypupil mastersroom. During that time Ishadowhis professional life completely.


96/99

Key


97/99

Key

Although all pupillages are for twelvemonths, if they think you have noprospect of finding a tenancy in the

chambers, after six months you would betold discreetly. Chambers runs advocacytraining evenings to reduce the loss of

opportunity to exercise rights ofaudiencein court.

Key


98/99

Key

When Ive practised for more than tenyears, Id be interested in being appointedas a senior barrister, with a specialist

area such as employment law.

Additional information


99/99

Additional information

Barristers:

www.barcouncil.org.uk

Solicitors:

www.lawsociety.org.uk/home.law

International professional organisations

www.ibanet.org
http://www.barcouncil.org.uk/http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/home.lawhttp://www.lawsociety.org.uk/home.lawhttp://www.barcouncil.org.uk/

Documents

Legal Profession in England13