Be a Judge Webinar 13 April 2012Transcript

Helen Whiteman:

Good afternoon and thank you for joining us. I’m Helen Whiteman, Head of Corporate Affairs at the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives. I’ll be chairing today’s webinar on behalf of the JAC and CILEx. The session will last approximately one hour and there is one CPD point available. Please use the code Judicial Webinar 2012.

It’s going to follow a question and answer format. I’ll be posing questions to our two speakers and there’s an opportunity for you to send in your questions which I’ll ask at the end.

Our speakers today are Upper Tribunal Judge Gleeson – Welcome – and our first speaker, Stuart Burrows, who is a Selection Exercise Manager at the JAC. Good afternoon to both speakers.

Stuart, if I could start with you please. Can you tell us about the JAC and the types of role that you recruit for?

Stuart Burrows:

Well, in brief, the Judicial Appointments Commission is an independent commission, set up - formed in 2006, and really set up to make the appointments process independent, transparent and fairer. And our statutory duty and obligation is to select, on merit only, those of good character, and to encourage applications from as wider a pool of candidates as possible.

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In terms of the types of position, we select people for salaried and fee paid appointments – everything for legal and non-legal roles – ranging from High Court Judge to legal – sorry – medical member of tribunals, for example.

Helen Whiteman:

OK, so thinking about CILEx and its members – what roles can Chartered Legal Executives apply for?

Stuart Burrows:

Well if you’ve been a Chartered Legal Exec for 5 years, then generally you will be eligible for a number of judicial appointments, but in brief you’d be looking at Deputy District Judge for the Civil Side of things or the Magistrates Court – Deputy Judge for both of those - or – and perhaps more widely – the First Tier Tribunal Appointments, which might include things such as the Health and Education and Social Care Chamber , or Employment Tribunals for example.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. So thinking about those roles that are available to our Chartered Legal Executives, can you just tell us a bit more about the differences between the roles?

Stuart Burrows:

I suppose if you take the courts on one side and tribunals on the other, there’s certainly a lot of similarities, but the key differences are that usually in courts appointments you’ll be sitting and making decisions on your own, whereas on the tribunal side you would generally be sitting as a

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panel of 2 or 3, as the legal member of that panel, but making a decision as part of a team in that sense.

In courts you might typically be hearing criminal cases or civil matters, whereas in tribunals - many of the tribunals - you’ll be hearing appeals against decisions made by government departments in that sense.

Helen Whiteman:

So would you say that the structure in a tribunal is a little bit more informal – relaxed.

Stuart Burrows:

Yes, it’s hard to say absolutely in all cases, but in many of the tribunals there is a more relaxed setting, and that demands a very different set of skills to what is expected in a more - sometimes more formal court setting.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. So what roles do you have coming up that Chartered Legal Execs can apply for?

Stuart Burrows:

Well open right now – open for applications up until the 19th April – is the fee paid Social Entitlement Judge – that’s one of our first tier appointments. And then coming up very soon there’s the Deputy District Judge, Civil – which is another fee paid exercise – and then slightly more on the horizon towards the summer – launching around July time – is the fee paid Judge of what we call HESC – the Health, Education and Social

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Care Chamber – that’s specifically for mental health, both for England and for the Welsh equivalent as well, which is MHRT – but both mental health side of things.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. I am sure we’re going to hear a variance thinking about salaries, but typically what sort of salaries do these type of roles attract?

Stuart Burrows:

We’re talking about daily rates generally for the fee paid posts. For example DDJ, Civil – so Deputy District Judge, Civil – we’re looking at £468 a day, and the post that’s open at the moment –Social Entitlement Chamber – you’re looking at £436 per day – so very comparable and close to each other. Just as a guide as well, on the salaries side, the District Judge, Civil post pays just over £100,000 as a salary.

Helen Whiteman:

So quite attractive then. So thinking about the selection candidates, what criteria does the JAC look for?

Stuart Burrows:

As with our statutory duty – the key thing which we’re looking at and which we select on – is merit – and that’s our sole focus, but the way we go about doing that is through what we call qualities and abilities, which many people would call competencies. There’s five of those. They are intellectual capacity, personal qualities, an ability to understand and deal fairly, authority and communication skills, and efficiency. And there is a slight variation if it’s a management post that you’re applying for where

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there’s leadership involved as well, but generally for fee paid posts you’ll be looking at those that I’ve outlined there. And what we’d be looking at doing is testing and allowing candidates to demonstrate how they can meet those through, firstly their application form and through the qualifying tests if applicable in that exercise, through the interview and the role play, as well as references which we’ll probably mention later on.

Helen Whiteman:

OK. Thank you. So really when you’re demonstrating those qualities and abilities you need to give real examples not hypothetical, and the preference would be leaning towards examples from your professional life.

Stuart Burrows:

Absolutely. Yes. It’s not – people don’t have to mention names or what the actual case was but we do need specifics of what they’ve actually done. It doesn’t have to be from their professional life all the time. If you have a very good quality example from outside of your professional life that you think demonstrates the quality, then that’s very much worth using. And it’s worth having a number of examples for each of the qualities to deploy at different stages as well.

For example, a candidate I know, that both I saw for authority and communications, gave what we thought to be a good example, in terms of a client that they had who had learning difficulties, and how they went about ensuring that they were adapting their style to them, how they were ensuring that the client understood them, and how they got their message across to them by adapting how they would normally work. So that’s perhaps some sort of flavour of the kind of examples you might look at.

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Helen Whiteman:

Thank you for that, I think that will be of benefit to the audience. Just for the audience’s benefit – you have a download tab available to use – there are various articles there from our CILEx Journal Magazine – a copy of which I have here – the latest edition. I am going to be talking to Stuart now about the application process. There’s quite a lot of information within that answer that he’s going to give. Just to let the audience know that you have got a download there, which is a nice flow chart – a summary of that process – so you don’t need to take any notes – it’s there for you. So over to you Stuart. What’s the process?

Stuart Burrows:

For that very reason I’ll try and keep it quite brief because there’s a lot of information there and also supporting information on our website. It all starts really from a candidate’s perspective, in terms of when the vacancy opens. We open for applications and normally people have a three week window to fill in their application form, but the key thing is to actually - for the candidates to start their process before that. Really the application forms are often quite similar and certainly we will always be asking for a self-assessment at some stage in the process from candidates. So it’s well worth having a look at some previous application forms now on the website, and really starting to think about what examples you have to meet each of those qualities and abilities, and actually starting to put pen to paper and flesh those out – and thinking about – you know - every day in your working life – what examples are coming out.

Helen Whiteman:6

I’d like Judge Gleeson to give a perspective, having applied for several commissions. How did you approach the application form? How long did it take?

Judge Gleeson:

Dealing with the modern application process, because it’s changed quite a lot over the years, I think it’s worth – if you think you might want to be a judge, it’s worth just keeping a folder with examples of things that happen in your practice - problems you’ve solved, issues you’ve dealt with – times when you’ve had to adjust your style for particular sorts of clients – times when perhaps something has been difficult and you’ve resolved it, where you’ve had a challenge - just accumulate them, because it is quite difficult sometimes when you’re filling in the form to come up with the examples if you haven’t prepared.

I usually find that you need to set aside a whole day to fill in the form. It’s quite a long form – it’s quite a complicated form, and the self-assessment bit at the end of it is how you sell yourself for the post that you’re applying for. I wouldn’t recommend that you have a series of standard answers that you cut and paste. It’s very important that you’re looking at the job you’re actually applying for. I know the qualities are more or less the same but that you’re tailoring the examples to the sort of work you’re hoping to do.

Helen Whiteman:

So each application to be dealt with on an individual basis?

Judge Gleeson:7

Yes. Obviously there are parts where you fill in your qualifications, but even then – there’s a place on the form where you fill in the sort of professional associations you belong to – the sort of hobbies you have – and those sorts of things. Each job might require you to look hard at the range of things you do and remember to emphasise the ones that are relevant to the sort of work that you might be trying to be considered for.

Helen Whiteman:

Stuart, did you want to continue.

Stuart Burrows:

So after the application stage, really we then move through – we check eligibility of all candidates, as per what would be advertised with the post, certainly almost – well every post will have statutory eligibility which candidates need to make sure they can meet as a minimum. We then move on to the short listing stage, and that will be undertaken either by a paper sift or a qualifying test in most instances. I won’t go into too much detail about a paper sift because that’s quite similar to many other application processes people would go through, and more likely - certainly in the fee paid posts - most of the short listing is done by a qualifying test. And that is a written test which is devised and written by judges in the jurisdiction, and which is quality assured through a number of means, and generally we’d be looking at giving candidates scenarios and situations in that that they might find themselves in once they take up the post of judge in that jurisdiction, where we would be looking for them to identify issues, weigh up the pieces of evidence and apply the law to reach the answer that they’re going to give.

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We’re going through a process at the moment of piloting and testing moving those tests online, and we do have a number of exercises, or a few exercises, which have been conducted online with the qualifying tests, so that candidates can undertake the tests at more of a time and a place at their convenience, as opposed to the old style, if you like, where candidates would all come to a hotel or a conference room to take the test in large groups.

Helen Whiteman:

So making it much more accessible then for those candidates?

Stuart Burrows:

Yes.

Helen Whiteman:

Do you know – are there any forthcoming exercises that will be assessed online?

Stuart Burrows:

Certainly the Deputy District Judge, Civil exercise which is coming up very soon – I think opening within the next month – is planned to be online – that’s still to be absolutely signed off – but that’s the way it is at the moment.

So moving on from there, it’s worth talking about references at this point. Depending on the short listing method that we use, referees are approached either before the paper sift - because they’re needed for the paper sift – or after the qualifying test, and then only for candidates that

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are proceeding beyond that stage. It’s worth mentioning at this stage that, with references – with referees - it’s always worth checking with the referees that they are happy for you to name them before you do so – just out of a matter of courtesy.

We would – we’ll be looking for two different categories of referee if you like. One is what we would call the judicial or professional referee, and we would specify that you need to name effectively your Line Manager or equivalent as that one – as the professional referee. And then you’ll be able to name up to three of what we would call personal referees – so they’re of your personal choosing, and they should be people who can give evidence as to your competence and how you meet the qualifies and abilities.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. Just picking up on what you said about Line Manager – Judge Gleeson if I could ask you: Most of our members are employed. How did you go about selling the benefits of a judicial appointment to your employer?

Judge Gleeson:

Well, when I started thinking about applying I was a Solicitor in private practice and I’d been doing that job for about 15 years or so I suppose at that point. You used to have to have been doing it for longer than you do now. And when I looked into it, I went to my professional partner and I said – look the commitment is 30 days a year – I appreciate that’s a reasonable amount of time out of the office, but what we get for it is that we raise the profile of the practice significantly. We get an understanding of how the judge is thinking, which actually is a distinct advantage for us in practice because it focuses what you say when you get back into court.

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You suddenly realise – oh the point was that – you’ve been in the habit of going into court and spreading everything out on the table and maybe making quite a long argument – and you realise the judge has been trained to think like this, and actually they are looking for particular things. So there is a tremendous amount of judicial training – we are highly highly trained – regularly trained – CPD points of course are a concern to any professional. This covers your CPD points pretty thoroughly. You get all the relevant textbooks free – you get fantastic online materials – and there are all sorts of secondary benefits. And when I’d explained it to my professional partner, he was very happy for me to do it, and in fact having sat as a fee paid judge for about five years, when I left the practice and became a salaried judge, the person who took on my post applied to sit part time, and does sit part time, so my old firm still has a fee paid judge because now they’ve tried it they know the benefits. It’s good for the practice as well as being good for the individual.

Helen Whiteman:

Stuart, you talked about candidates choosing referees who have a direct knowledge of their professional or voluntary work that they may do. I think it’s important perhaps to highlight that there are guidance notes now available for those referees, so that it’s not just – yes, of course, Stuart would make a fantastic judge because I said so – it’s referring back to those qualities and abilities that you’re looking to evidence.

Stuart Burrows:

Absolutely, and again we publish those on our website and we do send them out to candidates and referees with the request. I’d only add in terms of the references as a more general thing – there is a section on all of our application forms for judicial referees – that’s only for candidates to need use if they have a judge who would act as a referee for them, so

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generally for those in a judicial appointment at the moment. They won’t get a black mark against them or anything if they don’t, and in fact if they put somebody down who can’t really give very much detail, it won’t really help them in any way, and many of the judges at the moment get reference requests that they’re not able to answer. So it’s best just to put people who can really comment on your abilities.

Judge Gleeson:

That comes back to what you were saying earlier Stuart, about having the courtesy to go to the person you’re thinking of naming and saying - look – I’ve applied for so and so – I don’t want to know what you would say but are you happy for me to suggest you as a referee. And then if they really feel they don’t know your work well enough they can say – well, you want to try someone who’s got more current knowledge of your work.

Stuart Burrows:

Yes, that’s a point.

Judge Gleeson:

And it’s better that than to get a rather vague reference which may actually count against you - or at least fail to show your qualities.

Stuart Burrows:

Yes, it certainly wouldn’t give any positive evidence towards your qualities.

Helen Whitemore:

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Stuart, can you take us on to the Candidate Selection Day.

Stuart Burrows:

So next in the process is the Selection Day, and again for fee paid appointments in most cases that would involve a role play followed by an interview. The role play again would be the part that most people may not be familiar with, and that would involve arriving at the venue for the interview and role play – being given some information – a set of papers to review – normally on the day you’d be given about half an hour to review these – and then you’d be put in a role play situation where you’re playing the part of the judge in the jurisdiction that you’re applying to – there’d be professional actors playing a couple of the other parts – and really it’s just a chance for you to showcase how you would go about doing things – and actually showing the qualities rather than just talking about how you can demonstrate you qualities which you get the chance to do in the interview.

Helen Whitemore:

Is there something there about character checks as well, which are made of the professional bodies such as CILEx or whoever?

Stuart Burrows:

Certainly when candidates arrive for their Selection Day they will be asked to fill in a consent form that they are happy for us to go out and conduct checks with their professional bodies and with a number of other bodies, such as the Police, on that side of things. So really that is just our way – we will go out to undertake those checks if we are likely to be recommending them for selection after Selection Day. It’s them giving

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consent, and really it’s us carrying out our statutory duty to ensure that all these people we are recommending for selection are of good character.

Helen Whiteman:

So assuming I get a green light from CILEx as to my professional capability and my character check, if I’ve got six points on my driving licence I need to declare it, because I need to be honest don’t I?

Stuart Burrows:

Absolutely. There’s full guidance on our website as to what you should declare but the general message is declare everything where you think it ought to be declared – there is clear guidance and things such as speeding fines should be declared even though they are quite common.

Helen Whiteman:

It’s all going to go against me.

Judge Gleeson:

The broad point is that the Lord Chancellor is looking for someone who is honest – someone who is upright – someone who’s reliable – and who isn’t going to be the victim of some embarrassing scandal after the event.....

Stuart Burrows:

Absolutely.14

Judge Gleeson:

.......so it’s much much better to be absolutely straight about anything that comes in the categories listed.

Helen Whitemore:

So follow the guidelines and if in doubt put it in.

Judge Gleeson:

Yes, absolutely.

Stuart Burrows:

In line with that, the Commission when they’re considering character declarations for candidates who are likely to be or who are being put forward for selection, they will look a lot more favourably on a full declaration rather than one where it seems that somebody may have withheld something.

Helen Whitemore:

Thank you. Just before you move on to the Selection Panel process, I just want to remind our audience - please do send me some questions that I can ask on your behalf. Thank you.

Stuart Burrows:

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So after you’ve been for your interview and role play – what we call your Selection Day – you’ll probably be with us for about 2 hours on that day typically – whilst we call it a Selection Day it’s really just a couple of hours of the day. After the panels have seen everybody, they will pull their reports together which they’ve been drafting, capturing all the evidence that you have displayed in your application form, your references and your interview and your role play in most circumstances – and really just seeing how well you’ve demonstrated that you can meet the qualities and abilities. And from that they draw up a merit list of where the best candidates are, and really just get everybody in an order of merit, and that is really how we make our decisions, and somewhere down that line, depending how many vacancies there are for a particular position, that’s where we’ll draw the lines.

From that point on, these reports – the reports that we are recommending go to a series of consultations – firstly with the Statutory Consultees, which in most cases includes the Lord Chief Justice and one other – the reports then go with the comments from the Statutory Consultees, to the JAC Commission Board to consider, before going on with all their recommendations to the Lord Chancellor.

Helen Whiteman:

So as a general rule of thumb then – and we won’t hold you to it – but once you’ve reached that stage...

Stuart Burrows:

Yes. Timings?

Helen Whiteman:

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Yes.

Stuart Burrows:

We’ve worked an awful lot over the last couple of years to reduce the time, and there’s still work to do in terms of reducing the time that it takes, but the average time for a selection exercise, in terms of the JAC’s involvement, is around 19 weeks at the moment. So that’s from the time when applications close to the time when we write out to the Lord Chancellor with our recommendation. Now it could take up to another 8 weeks after that time until you hear with a letter through the letter box saying you’ve been selected or unfortunately you haven’t.

Helen Whiteman:

Since we became involved with judicial appointments 2 to 3 years ago, that certainly’s improved in terms of speed, which I think is a positive thing for the candidates applying. Stuart, I just want to ask you – how does the JAC support candidates – applicants – who might require reasonable adjustments?

Judge Gleeson:

You’re talking about disability adjustments?

Helen Whiteman:

Yes.

Stuart Burrows:

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Well firstly we absolutely do support it – it’s key for us to have a diverse judiciary. We welcome applications from those with disabilities, and from the very first contact we have with candidates applying, we ask people to let us know if they feel if they will need any reasonable adjustments, and that can apply to any stage of the process – whether it’s writing the application form, the test, the interview – but equally I hear very favourable reports about once people undertake the role of judge, which I imagine .....

Judge Gleeson:

We go to endless trouble to adjust if necessary. An adjustment doesn’t have to be major. It can be a chair, it can be a keyboard, it can be something very, very simple. Some of my colleagues have a writing slope because they’ve got hand problems. But the thing about disability adjustments – yes, you have a right to a reasonable adjustment – not necessarily any adjustment but a reasonable adjustment – but nobody’s going to know that you need one unless you say – and nobody’s going to know what works best for you unless you indicate what it is that you need. So there is a right but there’s also a responsibility on the person who has a disability – not to go into details about the disability, but to say – I need an adjustment – this is what I would like. Sometimes the answer might be – well you can’t have that but how about this? But you will get the adjustment – the Lord Chancellors Department and the JAC are spectacularly good at dealing with disability I think.

Stuart Burrows:

The biggest point is that we will do our utmost to treat you fairly in those instances.

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Helen Whiteman:

We’ve touched upon a little about diversity across the – well the legal profession – the judiciary. Judge Gleeson, from your perspective is the nature of diversity changing in the judiciary?

Judge Gleeson:

Oh yes I think it is. When I started - probably about 20 years now – there were very few women – there were very few disabled judges except judges who became disabled while they were judges. There were very few people from any of the minorities. It’s improved enormously. But it’s really, really important that the people who judge everything – from crimes to disputes between citizens – to disputes between citizens and government departments which is what the tribunals do – as far as possible reflect the general population. And that means if you are a member of a minority – if you are – well I’m a grammar school girl – I’m a women – that was rare when I started out – I have got a disability – if you don’t apply it’s never going to get any better. There’s no point sitting there saying – oh they’re not very diverse. Fill in the form – put your hand up – get out there.

Helen Whiteman:

Certainly from the profession’s perspective, as well as other stakeholders in the community, there’s a lot of work going on behind the scenes to support - things such as the Neuberger Recommendations on Judicial Diversity. So the professions aren’t resting on their laurels but of course we need our members to come forward and have the confidence to apply for those posts.

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Judge Gleeson:

What I would say is that historically, and still I think to a very great extent, if you’re not a barrister, it’s a better place to start, to start in the tribunals. The tribunals have been doing diversity for longer and they do already have a much more diverse range of judges, particularly I think in the First Tier Tribunals, and there are some really interesting roles there. I know of a number of people who have two or three different appointments across the different chambers, and if you look at the sort of work they’re doing, it’s quite likely that it will be the same kind of things that you’re dealing with in practice on a regular basis. So I’m saying not only don’t overlook the tribunals, but look there first because it’s a great jumping off point.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you for that. Before we move on to dispelling some of the myths around judicial appointments, can I just ask you Stuart - what level of feedback is available to candidates at any point throughout that application process?

Stuart Burrows:

We go to great trouble to try to provide feedback at every stage, but it differs depending on the number of candidates that are needed, but our general policy is that at short-listing stage – so at the results of a sift or the results of the qualifying tests – we have the judges work with us and the panels who’ve been taking decision – we have them work with us to draft a feedback report. So that gives a good level of detail of the general trends of what people did well and what people didn’t do quite so well, or what they should have been saying as an answer to a certain question.

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And that’s something we’ve just really been doing over the last year approximately, and it’s received praise from the candidates generally speaking.

Then at the Selection Day stage we are able to give a much greater level of feedback, and if candidates request it then we will write to them individually with a precise feedback as to what they did well and what they could look to improve on if they were looking to make further applications.

Judge Gleeson:

What I would say is don’t be afraid of asking for feedback. I mean it’s the nicest thing to do – you get a rejection letter and you ring up and say – OK - so what did I do wrong? Or you write in and say – OK, so what did I do wrong? What did I not do quite so well? But it can sometimes take a couple of applications before you get appointed and there can be things that you could be working on, and actually it’s really interesting. Yes, it’s not the jolliest thing in the world but it’s very important to show that you are prepared to change – that you are prepared to learn. Nobody will ever think less of you for asking for feedback if you didn’t get a post.

Stuart Burrows:

Oh absolutely, absolutely.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you to Josephine who asked that question. I hope that’s answered it for you. So let’s dispel some of the myths then. First question: Do you have to know a judge to become a judge?

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Stuart Burrows:

No.

Judge Gleeson:

Absolutely not.

Helen Whiteman:

Great!

Stuart Burrows:

No, in terms of the process and the way that we work at the JAC, we deliberately set out the processes so that we don’t care, if you like, what your legal background is – what school you went to – what university you went to – your ethnic origin – and so on. None of that is taken into account on selection decisions – it’s all based on merit.

Helen Whiteman:

Perfect. So do you need to be a litigator or an advocate to become a judge?

Stuart Burrows:

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No, equally, people can come from any background. You’ve really just got to prove that you have the qualities and abilities and that you have, not necessarily that last week you were in court, but I think it’s important that if somebody isn’t regularly practising in court – and I’m sure Judge Gleeson will add to this – that they do take themselves to the courts or to the jurisdiction where they’re looking to apply, and learn a bit more about it – see how people operate in that court or that tribunal – and gain some experience, even if it’s not as a practising lawyer in that particular court or tribunal.

Judge Gleeson:

The JAC has an excellent work shadowing scheme which means that you can spend – I forget whether it’s 3 or 5 days with a judge in the jurisdiction that you’re in. But also you have to remember all the courts in this country, or practically all of them, are open – anybody can walk in and sit at the back. Take a day off...

Helen Whiteman:

Go and experience the environment.

Judge Gleeson:

....go and see what happens. Just sit quietly at the back. Sooner or later somebody will ask in most tribunals whether you’re with one of the parties – and you say, well no – I’m thinking of applying for a judicial appointment. Be bold. Say – is there any chance I could have a word with the judge at the end of the hearing? Most judges will be quite happy to have a chat informally at that point. Not all of them but most of them. Get your head round what’s going on.

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Helen Whiteman:

So that leads nicely into the question about preparation for applications. How do I know when I’m ready? What can I do to prepare myself, other than as Judge Gleeson has suggested, going to sit in courts or there’s a fantastic judicial work shadowing scheme?

Stuart Burrows:

I think the first point I’d make is that meeting the statutory eligibility requirements doesn’t necessarily mean you’re ready. There may be some exceptional lawyers who are ready as soon as they meet these, but the competition is fierce for positions – even more so in the courts than tribunals applications – sometimes we’re having as many as 15 candidates for every one vacancy that we have. So really you need to be able to prove that you are better than 14 other people certainly in that – in the ratios terms of things.

Judge Gleeson:

And it’s worth going in gradually isn’t it Stuart? Usually much better to go for a fee paid appointment first – spend a couple of years getting used to how it works in that particular court or tribunal – getting to know the people – getting to know the law – getting comfortable with it – and making up your mind whether you want to make a career out of it. Because although there isn’t a strict requirement, the understanding is that once you go into a salaried post, that’s it – you’re not going back to practice. It’s a big decision.

Stuart Burrows:24

Yes – that’s the key. And I think the Lord Chancellor’s guidance at the moment is certainly that people should have – that applicants should have - fee paid experience before applying for salaried posts.

Judge Gleeson:

It’s very helpful.

Helen Whiteman:

I think there are a lot of resources available as well for applicants, people who are interested in applying. There’s information on the CILEx website as well as the JAC website. There are case studies there. There’s the role play video.

Judge Gleeson:

And of course there are judicial websites too.

Helen Whiteman:

There are judicial websites as well.

Judge Gleeson:

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Judiciary.gsi.gov.uk has all sorts of material about how the judiciary works, what sorts of judges there are. Pictures of courtrooms – all that sort of thing.

Stuart Burrows:

I’ve just had another couple of points on your question Helen as well. You talked about filling in the application form earlier, and if you sit down to fill in the application form and the self-assessment in particular, and you’re finding it difficult to come up with examples, that may well be an indication that you’re not ready. So spend the six month period, as the Judge suggested, building your examples, making notes of your examples, and when you find that you’ve actually got quite a number of examples, that might be a good indication that you’re ready.

Judge Gleeson:

And given how competitive it is, if you don’t get through, it’s not the end of the world – don’t be afraid to try again.

Helen Whiteman:

OK well that leads nicely into a question that we’ve had here from Maggie – thank you Maggie: Is there a limit to how many times you can apply if you’re unsuccessful the first or second time?

Judge Gleeson:

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There isn’t is there?

Stuart Burrows:

No, there’s not. We don’t – and equally it’s important to note that we don’t take any account of previous applications when you make a new application. So it’s not written down....

Judge Gleeson:

So it’s a clean sheet every time isn’t it.

Stuart Burrows:

Yes – it’s not written down – oh this is Maggie’s 15th application, so treat her better or worse – it’s a fresh clean slate each time.

Judge Gleeson:

And you’re always competing against everybody else. So it depends on not just the strength of you but the strength of the competition.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. It’s relevant to the conversation – Penny sent in a question for Stuart. You talked about the Selection Day and that it lasts about 2 hours – how is that split between role play and time with the interview panel – is it 50/50 or...

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Stuart Burrows:

It’s a bit more complex than 50/50. Generally – and this will vary but you’ll be notified on each individual occasion – the role play – as I mentioned before, you may get – you’ll probably get about half an hour to prepare for that when you arrive – so that’s part of the 2 hours. You might then typically spend about half an hour undertaking the role play, which could be split into two slightly separate parts. Then you’ll normally get about a 10 minute break, and then somewhere around 45 minutes or 50 minutes of interview – so roughly speaking 2 hours.

Helen Whiteman:

OK. If you want to have a look at that, it’s on the JAC website – there’s a mock role play and interview for you to have a look at in your own time. Thank you. So preparation and planning is key then?

Stuart Burrows:

Yes.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you Stuart. We have heard about the application process. I want to hear from you Judge Gleeson about your life as a judge. Could you perhaps tell us about your professional background to start with.

Judge Gleeson:

Well, as I say, I started out as a solicitor, which wasn’t a typical route into being a judge. I think there are far more solicitor judges now than there were but it certainly wasn’t typical then. And I’d been practising in a small

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office in the country, dealing with all sorts of different clients, learning, I now realise, to adjust my style to different people and to look out for problems before they happened, and to deal with all the things that can go wrong in the office – all of which are transferrable skills. And at the time that I was thinking of applying I had a young family, and one of the things about being in practice, as your members will know, it follows you home – people phone you up at the weekend – people phone you up after hours – you’re dealing with deadlines which are set by the courts if you’re a litigator – you’re on the receiving end of fairly strict deadlines quite often.

One of the things I noticed when I started sitting as a judge is that you’re setting the deadlines, and work doesn’t follow you home, and the clients – the people who are using the court – they don’t phone the judge up at home – so actually from the point of view work/life balance it was a really positive change. But for, I suppose, about a couple of years, I continued practising as a Solicitor. I hadn’t been to private school or anything like that – I came from a fairly normal background – and it worked in with my practice – and I realised my practice was sharpening because of all the training I was getting – I was starting to look at it from the judge’s point of view. Clients would come in and I’d say – well what are they going to want to know – this – this – this and this. So that was a very positive thing.

And then I had a very young baby - I wanted to spend more time with him - so actually I stopped practising and I just sat part time a lot for a couple of years, which was a good way to improve my judicial skills, to learn to be the best kind of judge I could be, and to spend time with my baby, and then when he went to school I applied for a salaried post, and that’s the point at which you burn your boats. You say to yourself – right – do I really want to do this because if I do, this is a choice for the rest of my

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career. And I have to say I’ve never regretted it for a minute – it’s been enormous fun.

Helen Whiteman:

Good. I had a question come in from Sharon - and I know you’ve got a great answer to this Judge Gleeson: Do you have to have experience in the field you are thinking of going into, e.g. if you were looking at applying for the Employment Tribunal, would you need experience of Employment Law?

Judge Gleeson:

Of course it’s helpful but it’s not essential because the qualifying tests now are designed to pick up your skills – to pick up your natural attributes, and the training is fabulous. Once they get you they make sure that you know what to do. But you need to be honest – you need to be upright – you need to be capable of making a decision – you need to be capable of dealing with all sorts of different people – you need to – actually a lot of them are the skills you’re already using in the office. Have a look at the qualities – they’re not that different.

Helen Whiteman:

So what was your experience of the application process? We’ve heard from Stuart what it was, but how did you find it when you were applying?

Judge Gleeson:

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Well I can’t count the first couple of applications because it’s changed so much. I mean my first application lay at the JAC’s predecessor for 18 months then I got a phone call saying your interview’s next Thursday! It doesn’t work like that now. You fill in the form – the form takes ages because you’ve got to really think about who you are in relation to the job that you’re wanting to do, and make sure that you set your stall out properly, because this is the first thing they’re going to see about you and if there’s a sift it may be the last thing they see about you.

And then you wait and eventually you either get - these days you’re usually invited to an Assessment Day – and you go off and you do your assessment. The assessment is very interesting because the role play mixes the sort of things that happen in court with the sort of things that might happen in your chambers when you are preparing for court. And it’s not a test of your legal knowledge, it’s a test of your people skills really – it’s a test of your ability to make a quick sensible decision about something that’s come up as you’re going along. So I rather enjoyed that.

And then the interview – well the interviews are tough, but you know they’re entitled to a good look inside your mind if they’re going to let you loose on the bench. And that’s basically what the interview is. They have a good walk round inside your mind to see how it goes – to see what’s in there. To see what sort of a person you are. And you shouldn’t be afraid of that – and actually again, if you approach it like that it’s quite good fun I feel. It’s nerve racking but I’ve enjoyed it.

And then you wait a while and you wait a while and eventually you get a letter – it’s not so essential now I gather – saying - yes you have been appointed/no you haven’t been appointed – and if it’s no, you go for feedback and you start preparing for the next application, if that’s something you really want.

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And the n there’s usually a pause of several weeks – and sometimes several months – while the Lord Chancellor decides if he’s going to appoint you or not. It’s good – it’s fun.

Helen Whiteman:

So if you could give CILEx members one piece of advice, what would it be?

Judge Gleeson:

I’m a tremendous believer in judicial diversity, and the JAC’s been trying hard for years to achieve judicial diversity. But it can’t be done unless they’ve got people to choose from. They can’t appoint more women, more ethnic minorities, more disabled people, if those people are not in the mix to appoint. So don’t sit there – get out there – apply for something appropriate. Don’t apply for something silly – I mean don’t apply for Lord Chief Justice first time – apply for an entry level appointment in something where you’ve got an interest and some knowledge if possible – not necessarily knowledge – but something that gives you a nexus with what you’re looking to do. And then don’t be discouraged – keep trying.

Helen Whiteman:

OK Judge Gleeson. Before I move on to the questions that we’ve had from our audience, is there anything more that either of you would like to add to what’s already been said?

Stuart Burrows:

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Partly in relation to your last question and also there’s something we would welcome – is more of the CILEx members signing up to the dry runs, which you can do through our website. Really we run dry runs for both our role plays and our qualifying tests and our interviews. So if people want to give themselves a better chance and sample what it’s likely to involve, sign up for the dry runs - it’s part of our quality assurance process to make sure what we are doing will work and is fair, and it will also give them very good experience for applying in the future.

Helen Whiteman:

I think as well if they do sign up for those dry runs, that excludes them from applying for that particular exercise.

Stuart Burrows:

Certainly.

Helen Whiteman:

But there’s no harm in preparation.

Judge Gleeson:

But it doesn’t exclude you for a future application – just that particular one, that they’re testing.....

Helen Whiteman:

No.

Stuart Burrows:33

You can even be applying for another at the same time but just not that particular one.

Helen Whiteman:

OK, thank you. Is there anything more you’d like to add Judge Gleeson?

Judge Gleeson:

The other thing of course is to sign up to the Judicial Appointments website because they send out emails when appointments are coming up, so that makes it very much easier to keep track of what there is to apply for.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you both. I’d like to just move on to the remainder of the questions from our audience. Thank you very much for sending them in. The first comes from Julie, which is for you Stuart. Julie asks – is there a minimum age at which you would be considered too young for a judicial appointment. I suppose the converse of that is too old for a judicial appointment.

Stuart Burrows:

There’s no upper or lower age limit. In a sense there is – you could argue there’s a minimum age limit set just by the amount of experience that somebody has to have. But, as we’ve discussed, you need to have 5 years post qualified experience as a minimum, so really it’s more I think

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about a breadth of professional and life experience I think – which Judge Gleeson may be able to add to – but really that’s key – as long as you’ve got the skills to do the job it doesn’t matter how old you are at the lower end. Certainly I’d just add at the upper end while we’re on the subject, that there is a statutory retirement age of 70 for all judges and the Lord Chancellor would always expect that and ask that all candidates would be able to give 5 years of service as a minimum. So you’d need to be thinking when you’re applying – have I got 6 years at least - because by the time I get appointed it will probably be another year gone.

Judge Gleeson:

So in practice you couldn’t apply if you were much older than 64?

Stuart Burrows:

Pretty much, yes.

Helen Whiteman:

And then a question around the changing face of the judiciary. Judge Gleeson if you could answer this for me. Do you think that the selection process favours white, middle class Oxbridge educated males?

Judge Gleeson:

No is the short answer. The further up the judiciary you go, the more people you will find who fall into that category but that’s because they applied a long time ago. For example, when I first qualified as a solicitor, which was – I trained in the late 70’s, and my path at the College of Law was the first class they’d had where it was half male half female. If you

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don’t get people going into the profession, then they can’t mature to the point where they’re appointable. And it is taking a while for the knock on effect. But certainly I would say, in the first judicial tier at the entry level, it’s almost the opposite – there are a lot of women – there are a lot of minorities – there are a lot of everything in the tribunals – I think it’s not quite as good as that in the mainstream courts but it’s much much better than it used to be.

Stuart Burrows:

Yes, I’m not sure we have full diversity information for all of that but certainly anecdotally I would agree with what you said.

Judge Gleeson:

And it’s getting better - with every crop of appointments they are at least appointing proportionate to the number of applicants from a particular group - but again one of the problems is women in particular – we don’t apply – not enough of us. We’re that little bit more hesitant. We know we’ve got a lot to be modest about. We’re always expecting to get caught out I think that’s what it is. And there’s no pool therefore – or not a bit enough pool – for the number of appointments that ought to be being made. It’s much much better than it was but the best thing anybody can do is to make an application.

Helen Whiteman:

Good advice. Thank you. Judge Gleeson, if I could just ask you another question that’s come in from Shirley. She wants to know are you required to sit every month of the year, i.e. in a fee paid post.

Judge Gleeson:36

No, it varies from court to court. It depends on what they need and what you can offer. Some places will want you to sit one day or two days every month. Some places would much rather have you for a block of a week or a fortnight because their hearings tend to run for several days. It just varies and you can negotiate, but you usually have to bid for what you’re going to do well in advance. For example, I have to book my holidays and anything else I want to do at least 3 months ahead because the court managers have got to know who they’ve got available when and what cases they can lift. Within those constraints it’s actually very reasonable – it’s very negotiable – as long as you get the right number of days in within the year, because they will have people who only want to sit a day a month – and they will have people who only want to do a block of days every so often – they tend not to like it if you do all your days in one go because you can get behind on the law in the meantime and it’s always difficult to keep up with the law as all of us know. But court managers will be grateful for a mixture of people wanting a mixture of sitting patterns because that means that they’ve got the flexibility they need. Fee paid judges are the court’s flexibility.

Helen Whiteman:

OK, thank you Judge. Stuart, another question’s come in from Shirley – she wants to know - how do I know what kind of position in the tribunals I would be eligible for?

Stuart Burrows:

Essentially you’re looking at the fee paid first tier tribunal appointments, so there are a number of them that fall within that, and if you probably look on the HMCTS – the HM Courts and Tribunals Service website, you’d find the full tree of all of the different tribunals that fall under that.

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But any – I think – I’m fairly sure – any that fall within the first tier tribunal, CILEx members can apply for.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. Another question’s come in from Keith. Thank you Keith. Where would the appointee be required to sit – presumably not in his or her locality?

Judge Gleeson:

That rather depends what you’re applying for. The first job I applied for was as a part time Employment Tribunal Judge and we were told that we were not to apply in the courts that we most regularly sat in, because you couldn’t be a judge and also be one of the representatives – it just doesn’t look fair. So I was then practising in Surrey so I applied to sit in Croydon, which wasn’t all that far from home – it’s about 30 minutes away. I think that still applies in the Employment Tribunals. It does apply - you were saying earlier before we came on air....

Stuart Burrows:

There are certainly some tribunals – what I’d say is, for example, if you were a property lawyer and you applied and were successful in getting a post for the Employment Tribunal, then you could sit wherever you wanted because there wouldn’t be that conflict.

Judge Gleeson:

You wouldn’t be appearing in front of your colleagues.38

Stuart Burrows:

It’s really just considering, for each individual application or post that you go for – what might be the conflicts or what might a reasonable independent observer think if they saw me sitting in this court, taking this case. But you’d get guidance on that – and that’s the reason it’s dealt with more at the deployment end of things, once you have been appointed, and something that’s dealt with beyond the jAC’s remit. But that’s the more general...

Judge Gleeson:

But read the advertisements carefully because sometimes the advertisement is for a particular geographical area. In which case don’t assume that you can apply for that geographical area and say – oh whoops, well I really meant I wanted to sit in so and so. There will be a space – there will be a desk waiting for somebody.

Stuart Burrows:

The restrictions on sitting in terms of where would also be detailed in the terms and conditions which we would publish at the same time as the advertisement and information pack.

Helen Whiteman:

OK. We just have time to complete the final two questions in the remaining five minutes. The first question is from a colleague called Suzie. Does the JAC have quotas?

Stuart Burrows:39

No, absolutely not. We’re not working to quotas. What we are working to ensure is that we get the message out as widely as we can – to people from as many different backgrounds, and particularly from the target groups, which include CILEx and the protected characteristics groups – get the message out and widen the pool for people to apply. That’s our aim really.

Helen Whiteman:

And final question to you Judge Gleeson from Julia. You said that the training is excellent. What form does it take?

Judge Gleeson:

Well at the moment I have a regular weekly training over lunch. I get regular updates – materials – judgements – guidance. We have two or three days a year when we all go off and focus on something – usually in a hotel or conference centre – and every couple of years there’s a residential training course. When you first start sitting you do a residential training course almost immediately, and then regular top ups. And the training really is very very well organised by the Judicial College, and it’s absolutely excellent. The standard is fantastic.

Helen Whiteman:

Thank you. All that remains for me is to say thank you to our audience for joining us today. I hope that you’ve found the session informative and useful. Please do take some time to fill in the voting buttons and the opinions feedback tab that you can see in front of you. Remember that the downloads are there also to assist you. The webinar will be posted

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on the JAC website and I believe the CILEx website from next week, so if there are any colleagues that you’re aware of that perhaps weren’t able to attend today, please do let them know – pass the link on – spread the message.

Thank you again to our speakers – Judge Gleeson and Stuart from the JAC. Thank you to the JAC team who organised this event on behalf of CILEx, and my closing comment really is that we will hope that you will be successful in becoming the next Chartered Legal Executive Judge. Thank you.

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