A legal education

Loved this from a somewhat snide article in the guardian.co.uk, Making the would-be barristers of tomorrow face harsh realities of today

Undergraduate students to a large extent have unformed minds,” hit back Cambridge University professor Christopher Forsyth. “There is a danger of teaching them to advise before they have a mastery of conceptual thought.”

Same goes for quite a lot of lawyers.

And as for the jaw-dropping comment from City Law School associate dean Susan Blake,

The law is an attractive profession. And a success rate of one in 10 is a hell of a lot better than you get with the lottery

she clearly missed out on being taught by Professor Forsyth.

Blair Take 2 (Friday)

Richard Norton-Taylor excellent in guardian.co.uk this evening on new evidence from Lord Goldsmith: Chilcot inquiry: Blair shut me out says former legal chief, Lord Goldsmith

I was particularly struck by,

The document contains a handwritten note by [Sir David] Manning [Blair’s foreign policy adviser], warning: “Clear advice from attorney on need for further resolution.” Blair scrawled in the margin: “I just don’t understand this.”

Didn’t get it then, doesn’t get it now, probably never will.

And as for Lord Goldsmith, read the late Tom Bingham’s analysis in The Rule of Law, pages 120 – 129.

A new year of birding

Lured by reports of Bitterns and Harriers, yesterday saw us at Exminster Marshes. Having asked Caroline to park a little closer to the edge, I got out of the passenger door, took a couple of paces backwards and one leg went into the ditch up to my thigh. What I had thought was firm ground was in fact dead reeds over nothing. And I had to clutch at a bank of stinging nettles to haul myself back up. It was not a very auspicious start: and I squelched around for the next hour. It wasn’t that I was cold (I was) but felt such a plonk (plus was quite shaken).

And the birding? Well, no Bitterns, and the Harriers, one Marsh and one Hen, had been sighted but had dropped down, out of sight, about 30 minutes before we arrived. But a Kingfisher, wildfowl everywhere, and the lady Smew preening on the canal. Not a bad trip at all.

Exminster Marshes: early afternoon, New Year's Day 2011

Countdown to a new dispensation

An interesting piece in this morning’s FT by Jane Croft, Legal firms set for ‘Tesco law’, based on a recent survey by Smith & Williamson on whether, and to what extent, the top 100 law firms will use the deregulation of the legal services sector to raise external finance.

What is clear from this survey is that the top end of the legal market is preparing to take advantage of the Legal Services Act and, if the rumour mill is to be believed, so too are the external providers – whether Tesco, the AA etc. None of this is surprising.

But what about the “squeezed middle”? (Not mentioned by Smith & Williamson).

In my previous Lawslot Redux post, now six months old, I said that in the hurly-burly of practice it is sometimes difficult to take time out to think about what may be needed. I might also have added that the current economic environment is making fee earning work an imperative (no time for posts).

Yet as Giles Murphy of Smith & Williamson notes,

The provision of legal services will change radically in the next five years with consolidation, external capital, new entrants and mergers with other professions; those who are best prepared will be in a strong position to take advantage.

He is talking about using external finance to develop and grow faster than your rivals. And competitive advantage may be obtained in any number of other ways – but I am not convinced that the profession as a whole has yet come to grips with what the Legal Services Act will actually mean for us day-to-day. It is going to be an interesting run up to October.

Just a perfect day

The last day of a week’s holiday, and another day out with the birds.

We started the week at the London Wetland Centre – very cold and gloomy, and notwithstanding recent sightings of Bitterns, we didn’t see any (we always arrive at a hide to be told, “You should have been here five minutes ago; you’ll never guess what we have just seen . . .”) – but plenty of Snipe, Tufted Duck, and Coot.

Wednesday was another cold but bright day at Slapton Ley and on the beach at Thurlestone. Shovellers, Tufted Duck and a solitary Little Grebe in the reeds by the Slapton Hide, and plenty of Canada Geese and more Tufted Duck on the water. Robins everywhere, and a Sparrowhawk through the bushes at the edge of the Ley, upsetting the troupe of Longtailed Tits that was bowling along the edge.

It was late afternoon by the time we reached Thurlestone – we had to stop in Kingsbridge, where I was living when Caroline and I first met, and stop at the deli at the top of Fore Street and visit Pig Finka. The marshes behind the NT car park were frozen and there was very little duck around. Instead, there were Oystercatchers and Turnstones on the rocks edging the beach, and a wonderful sunset.

Today we have been at Roadford Lake. We didn’t know quite what to expect – we last visited in January 2009, and had then seen little (and been rained on). This time was different: in the woodland and along the edge, Nuthatches, Great, Blue, Coal, Marsh and Longtailed Tits, Greenfinch, 6 Bullfinches and half an hour later another 9, a Greater Spotted Woodpecker chased off by a solitary Raven gliding through the canopy, Crows, Rooks, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk and Buzzard, Dunnock, Blackbirds, a Song Thrush, Redwings, Goldcrests, Robins and Wrens – and on the water, Coot, Moorhen, Tufted Duck, Mallard, Teal, Widgeon, Gadwall, Pochard, Herons, Great Crested Grebes and a Little Grebe, Shag, 3 Goosanders, and in the last light of late afternoon, a pair of Goldeneye below the bridge.

A perfect day.