Geeklawyer is currently having to engage in the Bars ongoing tiresome and never-ending requirement to keep up to date with his legal education and skills.
Known within the zoo as ‘Continuing Professional Education’ or CPD this tiresome drudge is a mostly laudable initiative. However it is overdone and weakly policed to the point of making in significantly ineffective. One has to do 12 hours a year of which at least 4 hours must be Bar ‘accredited’, that is the Bar must have given approval to the contents of the course, and the balance can be unaccredited.
As one given to the occasional short cut Geeklawyer has been given to abusing the spirit if not the letter of the regulations. The trouble is, you see, that when one is busy earning a living by depriving others of theirs, one frequently has little time for taking a day or half day off to do courses (on this point though honourable mention has to be made of Charon QC’s second hobby). Nor, in truth, does he have much enthusiasm for being compelled to provide a captive market for course providers.
The result is that Geeklawyer has to scrape around for 8 hours of testicular filler and 4 hours of the cheapest course a tight-arse like him can find. The former results in him claiming hours for articles for ‘Womens Sewing Monthly’ entitled “10 new patterns for making a barrister’s wig”, or for some computer programmers magazine - found on the shelves of WH Smiths rather than Lincoln’s Inn’s law library - “How to make a fortune suing your employer”, largely irrelevant to his practice. Or stuff like the talks given to crusties “Destroying the government legally”, or a favourite with anarchists: “How to manufacturer and use WMD without leaving forensic traces and 10 guaranteed get-off excuses if caught.”
As for the latter accredited course requirement: when choosing courses Geeklawyer often chooses to select nonsense such as “Developments in ecclesiastical law” because it is has a £10 fee rather than the £2500 for courses actually relevant to him. All of which means he often has to claim to have a practise in ecclesiastical law, mediation, crime, housing, trusts and myriad other tosh he last saw at university.
Well, no, now you mention it I don’t have a solution: this is just a rant. I hate the panic at the end of the year realising I need to pull my finger out or lose my practicing certificate or have to grovel cap in hand the the Bar council for an extension of time.
My heart bleeds. Try the annual CPD requirements for solicitors/trainees.
Oh and housing law is tosh? As you are a barrister who isn’t actually used to having the client sitting next to you at court (not always a pleasant experience, granted), you might be speaking tosh. Particularly as, in yer average housing hearing, thinking on one’s feet is prized in counsel.
And yes, I frequently choose which counsel to instruct, even as a paralegal.
Of course, I luurve the blog, particularly the google ad for “Free Blog for teens” that appeared directly above the comment field.
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Generally I prefer to think on my bottom - it’s far more comfortable.
I confess to being a little perplexed by Googles choice of adverts based on the keywords in this page. I must deal with that some time.
Apologies for the randomly directed venting. I blame the heat, of course.
CPD requirements are a pain, but surely anything that involves the sensual delights of ecclesiastical law can’t be counted as wholly wasted.
[…] Geeklawyer just finished doing his CPD backlog: always a royal pain in the ass. This year it was far less hassle than the last. because I used an online CPD course provider a firm not entirely unconnected with geeklawyer blog commentator CharonQC. What did I think of it? As I discuss in the forum: cost effective informative and as painless as possible with a few minor rough edges. […]
[…] I quote: “Geeklawyer just finished doing his CPD backlog: always a royal pain in the ass. This year it was far less hassle than the last. because I used an online CPD course provider a firm not entirely unconnected with geeklawyer blog commentator CharonQC. […]