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Legal life changers

27 April 2018 / Fiona Bawdon
Issue: 7790 / Categories: Features , Legal aid focus , Training & education
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The Justice First Fellowship scheme is using law to change the world, says Fiona Bawdon

At The Legal Education Foundation’s (TLEF)’s February 2018 Justice First Fellowship (JFF) conference when the 20 newly appointed trainee solicitor and barrister fellows stood up to introduce themselves, two spoke of their personal experience of homelessness. Around half of those applying to the fellowship scheme in 2017 came from families where their parents had not been to university; a quarter of applicants had received free school meals; around half were from ethnic minorities.

The 2017 intake was the scheme’s fourth and largest. Earlier cohorts have included at least one teenage mum; and the first woman from a Roma background to qualify as a solicitor, Denisa Gannon (pictured with chair of TLEF trustees Guy Beringer). In an interview with The Guardian earlier this year, Denisa said it was the discrimination she faced in her native Czech Republic and when she arrived in the UK to work as a cleaner, which inspired her to become a social welfare lawyer. ‘I

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Birketts—trainee cohort

Birketts—trainee cohort

Firm welcomes new cohort of 29 trainee solicitors for 2025

Keoghs—four appointments

Keoghs—four appointments

Four partner hires expand legal expertise in Scotland and Northern Ireland

Brabners—Ben Lamb

Brabners—Ben Lamb

Real estate team in Yorkshire welcomes new partner

NEWS
Robert Taylor of 360 Law Services warns in this week's NLJ that adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) risks entrenching disadvantage for SME law firms, unless tools are tailored to their needs
From oligarchs to cosmetic clinics, strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) target journalists, activists and ordinary citizens with intimidating legal tactics. Writing in NLJ this week, Sadie Whittam of Lancaster University explores the weaponisation of litigation to silence critics
Delays and dysfunction continue to mount in the county court, as revealed in a scathing Justice Committee report and under discussion this week by NLJ columnist Professor Dominic Regan of City Law School. Bulk claims—especially from private parking firms—are overwhelming the system, with 8,000 cases filed weekly
Writing in NLJ this week, Thomas Rothwell and Kavish Shah of Falcon Chambers unpack the surprise inclusion of a ban on upwards-only rent reviews in the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
Charles Pigott of Mills & Reeve charts the turbulent progress of the Employment Rights Bill through the House of Lords, in this week's NLJ
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