Organ of change

The Law Society’s Education Committee is fundamentally a regulatory body, regulating admission to the profession, says Richard Hammond SC, who has recently stepped down as committee chair.

The committee supervises training and education for the Irish legal profession, which is now a sector worth €14 million a year in Ireland, he notes.

This is in addition to its oversight role on the Professional Practice Course (PPC) for trainees and Law Society Professional Training, which focuses on continuing professional development for solicitors.

The postgraduate qualifications the committee supervises range from diplomas to master’s to doctoral-level programmes. The committee also regulates the training relationship between firms and the trainee solicitors and, as such, is a very significant arm of the Law Society.

This substantial regulatory burden must be complied with outside of any other educational initiatives the committee also undertakes.

Its other recent projects include the first full overview and overhaul of CPD, which occurred in 2022-23. Solicitors this year have a completely redesigned CPD programme that is far more fit for modern expectations, Hammond says.

Don’t stop believing

The committee is also considering the idea of a series of ‘qualifications’ throughout the life-cycle of each practising solicitor, from being a law student to working as a seasoned lawyer.

Those who complete FE1s could be called ‘scholastic associates’ of the Law Society. On entering traineeship, one might become a ‘trainee associate’. On qualification, one becomes a Law Society member and is admitted to the Roll. And 12 years post-qualification, solicitors might be eligible to be called ‘fellows of the Law Society’.

“This would be a massive change. Heretofore, the only qualification received was the word ‘solicitor’,” Hammond notes, pointing to similar levels in other professions.

The committee is also involved in the significant redevelopment of the Blackhall Place Green Hall building to create an education hub that is fit for purpose, with space befitting the wide extent of the courses offered on campus.

“The space in Blackhall Place is already very much oversubscribed, and when this comes to pass, within a few short years, we are going to have far-extended capacity to offer courses,” Hammond says.

The expansion will particularly facilitate tutorials, workshops, and all the other in-person engagement that the Law Society offers, and which are less satisfactory on a remote basis.

The committee is also working on a formal protocol for return to practice and delayed entry to practice.

“While there are current provisions for dealing with these circumstances, it is somewhat ad hoc. We will be looking at practice in this and other jurisdictions, both in legal and other professions, to see what may be suitable from the perspective of regulating in the public interest, to ensure that knowledge and skills and practices are up to date when they return,” he explains.

Radar love

Routes to qualification are also on the committee radar. As well as the full-time PPC, which runs from September to April, there is a hybrid option, which runs from January to December.

“The full-time course remains immensely popular, and is at or over capacity every year, and that suits the traditional student coming almost immediately from their undergraduate studies into their training contract.

“From the perspective of our commitment to diversification of the profession and ensuring that people from diverse social and economic backgrounds can access routes to qualification, the introduction of the hybrid course has been key,” Hammond says.

The hybrid course is delivered on a ‘blended-learning’ basis, with most of the lectures delivered online so that they can be viewed by the student when s/he has capacity so to do, with suites of tutorials and workshops given on Fridays and Saturdays every three to four weeks throughout the year.

The material covered is precisely the same as that covered in the full-time course, and the tutors and lecturers are all the same.

“It is simply that the mode of delivery is adapted to suit those who are not in a position to commit to a full-time course in Dublin, particularly those who might be coming to qualification later in life, or those who might have caring, or other family commitments that simply don’t facilitate full-time learning,” Hammond explains.

In the medium term, the Education Committee will also be examining proposals to create an apprenticeship route to qualification, although significant research is still needed in that regard to ensure parity of standards.

“Ultimately, anyone who is given a practising certificate must, in the public interest, be capable of discharging their functions, co-equally with any other solicitor. However, it is recognised that not every potentially good solicitor is able to commit themselves to the many years of undergraduate learning required, while not being employed.

“The particular options that may be developed are still under consideration, and it would be premature to set out what they look like, other than to say this is under active consideration and is likely reach some sort of fruitful conclusion in the medium term,” Hammond explains.

School days

The Education Committee has nine voting members, and it is unique in that its composition is set by statutory instrument. There must be a minimum of five Law Society Council members in situ, and a maximum of four non-members of Council.

Hammond was recently replaced as chair by Brendan Cunningham (RDJ), while Justine Carty (Taillte Éireann) stepped into the vice-chair role.

The officers of the Law Society are also de jure members of the committee – president, senior vice-president and junior vice-president.

The officers normally don’t participate in its business, but are held in reserve in cases that need a rehearing by committee members who have not previously heard the matter and comprise an independent quorate committee.

The spread of committee members is geographically wide, drawing from big and small firms, Dublin and provincial practices, as well as in-house and public sector lawyers. One member is not a solicitor and comes from an education technology background.

This diverse cross-section of the profession is very helpful in bringing a good balance of perspectives to bear on decision-making, Hammond says.

In addition, the committee has several nonvoting consultants in attendance, including representatives of the judiciary and previous long-standing members, who bring wide experience and are free to express their opinions.

The committee meets with every Council meeting, a minimum of eight times a year, but may also have three or four bonus meetings when pressing admission matters arise, such as to the barrister-transfer course into the solicitor profession.

The Law Society’s Education Department also attends and weighs in on relevant matters. The committee deals with a wide number of applications concerning transfers, exemptions, and CPD queries, which leads to wide interaction with the profession.

“The entire offering of Law Society Professional Training is outreach to the profession,” Hammond explains. “Every trainee on the PPC course is indentured to a training solicitor at a firm, so that is also outreach to the profession, which is continuously interacting with the Education Department in some form or another,” he adds.

“At some stages in the past, it has been suggested that other providers may be licensed to undertake the professional legal education of trainee solicitors.The Law Society already does an excellent job in that respect. If such other providers were ever licensed, I do not think the Law Society would have anything to fear, such is the quality of the associate faculty, the course managers, and indeed the courses delivered.

“Nonetheless, given the number of trainee solicitors – which, in the greater context of educational offerings, is somewhat low in and of itself – I would question whether there is a critical mass of prequalification trainees that would justify broadening the number of providers.

“Equally, I would be concerned about any diminution in the standards of education received in any other course. The main benefit to the Law Society’s education offering to trainee solicitors is that they are being taught on the PPC by well-experienced seasoned colleagues who are giving of their time very generously.

“It is difficult to imagine that that would be replicated in a situation where other providers were in the market,” Hammond concludes.

Mary Hallissey is a journalist with the Law Society Gazette.

More information about the committee is available on the Law Society website.