Scrap the TC? Scrap the LPC?
Controversey on the training front this week… The LSPI, a think tank that was established by the CoL in 2007, has published a paper that proposes moving the point of qualification for solicitors to successful completion of the LPC. i.e. everyone that completes it would get to be called a solicitor. We can understand why everyone contemplating/studying/selling the LPC might like this as there are more LPC students than training contracts. Removing the final hurdle to qualifiaction (the training contract) or …
Controversey on the training front this week…
The LSPI, a think tank that was established by the CoL in 2007, has published a paper that proposes moving the point of qualification for solicitors to successful completion of the LPC. i.e. everyone that completes it would get to be called a solicitor.
We can understand why everyone contemplating/studying/selling the LPC might like this as there are more LPC students than training contracts. Removing the final hurdle to qualifiaction (the training contract) or as CoL chief executive Nigel Savage calls it, a “significant bottleneck in the qualification process” might encourage more students to go for the LPC knowing they don’t need to convince anyone to employ them afterwards to qualify.
But the suggestion probably wouldn’t do much for the overcapacity at the bottom of the profession. And it is questionable whether even a beefed up LPC is really a better introduction to being a qualified lawyer than working in a law firm for two years as a trainee. Can you really substiutute on-the-job experience? Plus when would law firms get to whittle down their final qualifiers?
The argument is that scrapping the two-year training contract would help to widen access to the profession and would be better suited to the new regulatory environment created by the Legal Services Act 2007. But our own devil’s advocate came up with this counter… surely scrapping the LPC would do that too. Any student could apply for a TC, firms could provide necessary training in-house via current providers in accordance with their needs and all the students who never get in to a firm will be spared the time and cost of the LPC. Bingo.
Actually there are pros and cons whatever route is considered but just scrapping the TC doesn’t look like it would be in the best interests of students or firms. The interests of law schools on the other hand…
More on access to the profession:
The Law’s Too Elitist – Let’s Raise the Bar
September 29, 2009
The current system is a compromise as with everything in life. It can probably be improved but calls to drop one part in favour of another are normally to do with vested interests trying to further their own agendas. Getting the balance right is difficult but there are many factors out of the hands of those implementing these decisions not least the economy.
September 29, 2009
‘Vested interest’ is a bit of an understatement. The College of Law is being a bit brazen in my opinion. It’s not exactly rocket science to see who might benefit if the training contract was dropped in favour of more legal education.
September 29, 2009
why all the noise about the LPC at the moment?
October 1, 2009
If we’re going to play with the system, let’s just stop calling them “trainees” for the first two years of their careers, as this title would suggest that they are little more than Mc-Job newcomers, who don’t yet know how to put the frozen chips into the little basket and into the hot oil, before pressing the magic button that beeps when the chips are ready to be salted.
Oh, and just to predict your answer, don’t say “but trainees ARE little more than Mc-Job newcomers, who don’t yet know how to put the frozen chips into the little basket and into the hot oil, before pressing the magic button that beeps when the chips are ready to be salted.”
Surely, they are more like the time-served 20-something who still lives with his mommy but has finally been put in charge of the grill.