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Attracting talent

29 November 2007 / Lord Neuberger
Issue: 7299 / Categories: Opinion , Profession
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Lord Neuberger discusses the findings and implications of his report on entry to the Bar

The Working Party on Entry to the Bar has spent the last 14 months considering how to improve access to one of our most historic and important professions. As its chairman, it has been my job to assist and co-ordinate the working party’s progress as it considered every aspect of the way in which the Bar should attract, recruit, and retain those people with the most suitable abilities and commitment.

AWARENESS AND ACCESS

Our final report, Entry to the Bar, published this week, identifies ways in which the Bar can expand its current initiatives to encourage, and then recruit, students who come from less privileged backgrounds, while simultaneously raising the standards of training for (and selection of) barristers. We have focused our efforts on reinforcing the Bar’s commitment to quality at all levels, and on introducing more far-reaching and co-ordinated initiatives to improve awareness and access for those from less advantaged backgrounds.

For too long, the Bar has been perceived

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Muckle LLP—Stacey Brown

Muckle LLP—Stacey Brown

Corporate governance and company law specialist joins the team

Excello Law—Heather Horsewood & Darren Barwick

Excello Law—Heather Horsewood & Darren Barwick

North west team expands with senior private client and property hires

Ward Hadaway—Paul Wigham

Ward Hadaway—Paul Wigham

Firm boosts corporate team in Newcastle to support high-growth technology businesses

NEWS
Neurotechnology is poised to transform contract law—and unsettle it. Writing in NLJ this week, Harry Lambert, barrister at Outer Temple Chambers and founder of the Centre for Neurotechnology & Law, and Dr Michelle Sharpe, barrister at the Victorian Bar, explore how brain–computer interfaces could both prove and undermine consent
Comparators remain the fault line of discrimination law. In this week's NLJ, Anjali Malik, partner at Bellevue Law, and Mukhtiar Singh, barrister at Doughty Street Chambers, review a bumper year of appellate guidance clarifying how tribunals should approach ‘actual’ and ‘evidential’ comparators. A new six-stage framework stresses a simple starting point: identify the treatment first
In cross-border divorces, domicile can decide everything. In NLJ this week, Jennifer Headon, legal director and head of international family, Isobel Inkley, solicitor, and Fiona Collins, trainee solicitor, all at Birketts LLP, unpack a Court of Appeal ruling that re-centres nuance in jurisdiction disputes. The court held that once a domicile of choice is established, the burden lies on the party asserting its loss
Early determination is no longer a novelty in arbitration. In NLJ this week, Gustavo Moser, arbitration specialist lawyer at Lexis+, charts the global embrace of summary disposal powers, now embedded in the Arbitration Act 1996 and mirrored worldwide. Tribunals may swiftly dismiss claims with ‘no real prospect of succeeding’, but only if fairness is preserved
The Ministry of Justice is once again in the dock as access to justice continues to deteriorate. NLJ consultant editor David Greene warns in this week's issue that neither public legal aid nor private litigation funding looks set for a revival in 2026
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