Stakeholders and their Interests

Twining observed that legal education is shaped by three entrenched spheres of influence, the universities, the Bar and the Law Society.¹⁰³ As far as law degrees are concerned this is certainly the case.

There is a generally a mismatch between those seeking legal careers and the oppor­tunities available. In 2003, 10,000 students accepted places to study undergraduate Law courses in England and Wales. In 2008 numbers increased to nearly 20,000¹⁰⁴ with over 60 per cent female and around 15 per cent from overseas.¹⁰⁵ In the same year nearly 14,000 students graduated.¹⁰⁶ In 2009, 9,337 students enrolled on the LPC, a number that includes conversion course students. Of these, 83 per cent sat the examinations in

¹⁰¹ Webb, ibid, at 296-97.

¹⁰² Boon, ‘Ethics in Legal Education and Training’ (n 32).

¹⁰³ W Twining, Blackstone's Tower: The English Law School (London, Stevens and Sons/Sweet and Maxwell, 1994) ch 2.

¹⁰⁴ B Cole, N Fletcher, T Chittenden and J Cox, Trends in the Solicitors' Profession Annual Statistical Report 2009 (London, The Law Society, 2009) at 29.

¹⁰⁵ ibid, at 30.

¹⁰⁶ ibid, at 31.

the summer or autumn. In 2009, there were just over 5000 traineeships available, down 500 on the previous year.

There were over 2000 validated places for the BVC in 2009 of which just over 1500 were filled.^[936] The overall pass rate was over 80 per cent.

A. The Academy

Nearly every higher education institution in the UK offers Law courses. The academy is extremely diverse, comprising institutions of different vintage, often created in waves. A significant line divides the ‘old’ universities, from the polytechnic institutions. As a gen­eralisation, ‘old’ universities adhere to the Ormrod view that the role of the liberal law degree is to educate rather than to train. Teaching staff tend to come through a doctoral research route. They assert the importance of providing a ‘liberal’ education, conceived of as the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake,^[940] producing a good citizen rather than a good lawyer, an educated person rather than a good worker.^[941] Polytechnics were formed with a view to providing more relevant, vocational degrees. Staff often had pro­fessional backgrounds and were sympathetic to a practical curriculum.

B. Government

i. Growing the Economy

Government has a direct financial interest in higher education through its funding of the system, including student loans. A recurring theme in higher education is concern about the contribution it makes to the economy. Since the 1980s, government percep­tions that universities were academic ‘ivory towers’, began to drive policy. Universities came under pressure to pay more attention to the ‘employability’ of graduates. They were encouraged to form relationships with employers and explore their needs. Many Law Schools responded by creating clinical programmes for students.

ii. Accessibility of Professional Careers

Since the Ormrod Report, accessibility to professional careers has been a recurring issue. Government is concerned to promote open access and meritocratic entry by ensuring there are no artificial or unnecessary barriers to entry or progression. In 1979, the Royal Commission on Legal Services found that 54 per cent of university law students had fathers with professional or managerial positions and while only 16 per cent had working class fathers. This compared with 50 per cent and 30 per cent in the general university student population.^[942] Those who attended independent schools were also disproportionately represented in the legal profession.

In 1994, the Law Society commissioned an important longitudinal study of entry to the legal profession. It found that most ethnic minorities were better represented on law degrees and conversion courses than the proportion they represented in that age group in the general population.^[943] The same study found, however, that only 18 per cent of law students had working class backgrounds.^[944] Whereas 6 per cent of pupils were at independent schools, 18 per cent of new university, 26 per cent of other university and 45 per cent of Oxbridge law students had been at independent schools at age of 14. One in five law students had a close relative in the legal profession. Among home students, this was a 10 times higher number than would be expected by chance.^[945]

One of the concerns arising from the demography of the student body was diversity. In the 1990s there was growing awareness of problems of social mobility and equal opportunity in access to legal jobs. Even at a time when more part-time, mature and disadvantaged students obtained law degrees, these larger numbers were not repre­sented in the profession. An associated issue was the motivation of potential lawyers. Would enough lawyers from privileged backgrounds want to work on public law and social welfare law issues?

C.

Students are an increasingly important body of stakeholders in legal education. Often, their influence is very indirectly applied through mechanisms such as the National Student Survey. This gives them an opportunity to comment on the educa­tion they have received. What they want or need is less obvious.

A small study of Warwick University students found that their motivations for studying law were mixed.^[946] In descending order students sought interest in subject matter, desire for intellectual stimulation, desire for professional training, desire to practise law, prospects of above average income, enjoyment of debating and argu­ing, desire for independence, expectation of a stable, secure future and the prestige of the profession. This was consistent with a much larger US study which found that students chose law for its offer of future independence, varied work, handling others’ affairs and interest in the subject matter.^[947]

Students consistently ranked altruistic reasons, such as the opportunity for public service, quite low among their priorities. Stevens found that restructuring society or working with the underprivileged came around the middle of the range of student motivations. The Warwick students were drawn to public interest subjects but put off by the financial prospects. Students see careers in Government Legal Service, for example, as a form of public service in which financial benefits are surrendered in order to work for the public good.^[948] Analysis of the motivation of entrants to the legal profession is confusing. It appears that students are keen to be involved in public interest law, but daunted by the career prospects.

i. Informing Student Choice

Career considerations are an important consideration for law undergraduates and most consider a legal career before applying to study Law.^[949] The Law Society lon­gitudinal study found that at age 16, more than 80 per cent of home law students had seriously considered a legal career, 50 per cent as a solicitor and 33 per cent as a barrister.^[950] Security issues, apparently, subsequently affected their choice of legal profession.

ii. Curriculum Needs

The Law Society longitudinal study found that undergraduates generally preferred a practical flavour to law degree studies. Law students seek degree courses that are consistent with their career aspirations. They prioritise technical mastery over broad goals such as personal development, understanding the social context of law, law reform and preparation as policy makers.^[951]

Surprisingly, the practically focused vocational courses always drew mixed reviews. There have always been a number of students who do not see the point of skills training in Law School or who resent paying substantial vocational course fees. Initial research into experience of the courses suggested widespread approval.^[952] The majority of students welcomed the practical orientation of the vocational courses and the integra­tion of skills and ethics. More than half of the barristers responding to the Bar study reported ethical difficulties encountered through naivete.^[953] The emphasis on dealing with clients, and other professionals, relieved their anxiety about what they may face in work.

iii. Careers

The fifth survey of the cohort study showed a close relationship between subject inter­est and intended work areas.^[954] Students had a strong orientation to social welfare subjects including Personal Injury, Commercial Law, Family and Childcare, Criminal Law, European Community Law, Employment and Human Rights. Many students with interests in these areas did not intend to work in them because of poor pay, lack of status or too few jobs. Human rights and EU law had a disproportionately high level of interest compared with numbers of trainees who expected to find work.

iv. Employers

Until relatively recently legal employers’ interest in legal education and training was limited to complaining that trainees have inadequate writing skills, research skills or knowledge of law. Loudest complaints came from large commercial solicitors’ firms, which tended to pay prospective trainees’ LPC fees. It was not surprising therefore when a group of elite law firms negotiated with three providers and the Law Society to validate a ‘City LPC’.^[956] The customised LPC delivered a curriculum suited to the practice of the sponsoring firms. In 2004 the ‘City five’ dropped two of the three providers, but agreements between individual firms and LPC for bespoke courses have continued. In 2006 a firm launched an LPC in collaboration with the College of Law for only 25 potential trainees studying over a single semester.^[957]

Competitor providers of the LPC described the notion of bespoke courses as divisive and unhealthy.¹²⁹ A more detached critic of the arrangement was Lord Woolf. He argued that isolating more able students from other entrants to the profession would negatively affect the quality of courses. Woolf also thought that separating students would undermine the important goal of ‘lawyers emerging into practice regard[ing] themselves as one profession’.¹³⁰ One concern is that trainees on employer-sponsored courses might not receive their education in ethics from an independent source.

D. The Legal Professions

The legal profession’s interest as a stakeholder in legal education includes convincing other stakeholders of its suitability as the guardian of the curriculum. It has gener­ally taken a conservative view of its custodianship, apparently out of a desire to avoid confronting the academic lobby. The failure to make legal ethics a central curriculum requirement is striking. The US made professional ethics a mandatory element of law degrees in the 1980s¹³¹ and Australia and Canada have since followed suit.¹³² Various bodies, of different levels of authority, have recommended introducing some such requirement over the past 40 or so years.

VI.