New Court Chambers – 12 months – October 2023

About AETO and Structure of Pupillage

New Court Chambers is a specialist family law chambers, offering high quality legal services to our publicly funded and private clients and providing expert legal advice across the full range of family law work.

We are recognised as a leading set by both Chambers & Partners and Legal 500, and a number of our members, together with our clerks, are recognised by both directories for the outstanding service they offer clients.

Chambers has a long-standing and well-established reputation in acting for local authorities, parents, other family members and children in all aspects of public law childcare work and you can expect this sort of work to form the basis of your pupillage with us.

Members of Chambers regularly appear in high profile and complex cases throughout London and the South-Eastern Circuit. We also provide specialist advice and representation in the fields of matrimonial finance (including disputes between cohabitees), Court of Protection work and Private Law children work, including cases with an international dimension.

Pupillage within chambers commences in October and lasts for 12 months. We generally take on 2 pupils. The first 6 months involves shadowing your Pupil Supervisor and assisting them with drafting and legal research. In your second 6 months you can expect to be undertaking your own advocacy in court on an almost daily basis, representing your own clients with your own caseload. You will continue to receive the support of your Pupil Supervisor throughout.

Our Pupils have 3 different Pupil Supervisors during pupillage (4 months with each) and so can expect to be exposed to the full range of work undertaken within chambers. We also provide regular in-house training for pupils, alongside periodic advocacy training and assessment where you can hone your advocacy in a supportive environment.

Pupillage Vacancy Information

Chambers recognises that the path to pupillage, and ultimately tenancy, is an expensive one, particularly as the cost of living increases. That is why we have recently reviewed our funding for pupillage and are pleased to now offer a guaranteed income of £36,000 over the course of pupillage. This is comprised of £18,000 in the first 6 months, and a guaranteed income of £18,000 in the second 6 months, although we would generally expect our pupils to earn more than this.

Equality Diversity and Inclusion

New Court Chambers has a pro-active Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion agenda, implemented and guided by advanced-trained Equality and Diversity Officers (EDOs).

New Court Chambers aligns itself fully with the Bar Standards Board’s Anti-Racist statement (latest of November 2020).

By way of practical steps being taken to ensure and promote diversity and inclusion in 2023:

• New Court Chambers is a participant in Bridging the Bar, the 10,000 Black Interns initiatives, and Bringing (Dis)Ability to the Bar (BDABar);
• New Court Chambers offers unassessed mini-pupillages throughout the year (and continued to do so through recent periods of public health restrictions);
• Members of chambers take part in outreach work privately and through their respective Inns of Court;
• Barrister members and staff at New Court Chambers have undertaken comprehensive (Bar Council-devised) Race Awareness training (last in Autumn 2022);
• The recruitment committee(s) review marking and selection criteria annually (with a particular view to ensuring that aspects of race, identity, and background are not barriers to any prospective pupils or tenants);
• Impartial work allocation is monitored by EDO (for compliance with the BSB Handbook equality rules) but also as part of Chambers-wide best practice reviews.

Further information/policies can be found at https://www.newcourtchambers.com/policies/

How to Apply

Applicants are invited to apply to chambers between Wednesday 4 January 2023 and Wednesday 8 February 2023 using the Pupillage Gateway application system to search for the relevant Pupillage Vacancy and selecting ‘Apply for this pupillage’.

In addition to the standardised Bar Council questionnaire, candidates will be asked to respond to the following questions from Chambers:

1. Why do you wish to practise family law? (1500 character limit)
2. Please give an example of when you were able to persuade someone to your point of view. (1500 character limit)
3. Please give an example of when you felt under considerable pressure and how you managed the situation. (1500 character limit)
4. What was the most interesting thing you did during the pandemic? (1500 character limit)