Professional qualification
The provision of legal services is rapidly changing, with exciting new opportunities opening up. We'll help you navigate through the maze. Lawyers work in a wide range of roles – advising businesses, individuals and public bodies and representing clients in courts and tribunals. We're a global law school, with many of our graduates moving into legal careers outside the UK.
England and Wales
All our LLB courses are 'qualifying law degrees', through which you complete the academic stage of legal education. After this, you can progress through further vocational study and practical training to obtain a professional legal qualification.
- To become a solicitor, you currently take a one-year Legal Practice Course and then complete a two-year training contract. This is due to change in 2020 (see below). There are more than 130,000 solicitors working in a wide variety of law firms and in government dealing with a whole range of legal transactions and disputes for businesses, individuals and other organisations. Some solicitors, with further training, represent clients in court.
- To become a barrister, you take the one-year Bar Professional Training Course followed by a one-year pupillage. About 15,000 barristers practice as self-employed professionals, offering specialist legal advice on complex matters and representing clients in courts and tribunals. Some barristers are employed as in-house counsel by businesses, government and the Crown Prosecution Service.
- To become a chartered legal executive, you take the CILEx Graduate Fast-track Diploma. Currently there are almost 8,000 legal executives, most of them working in law firms. They do similar kinds of work to solicitors.
- To become a licensed conveyancer, you take a part-time course authorised by the Council for Licensed Conveyancers while working. There are more than 1,000 licensed conveyancers who specialise in the legal process of transferring property from one person to another; some also deal with wills and probate when a person dies.
- It's increasingly common for law graduates to work as paralegals in law firms without a formal professional qualification in law or as a stepping-stone to obtaining a professional qualification.
Changes to the pathway to becoming a solicitor
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has announced it will be introducing the Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE). The earliest date for introduction is September 2020. This will be a national assessment for anyone who wants to qualify as a solicitor in England and Wales. It will provide a fair and consistent assessment for all candidates regardless of whether they have taken a law degree or qualified through new routes like the solicitor apprenticeship.
If you have already started your law degree, or will do so before the SQE is introduced, you will be able to finish and qualify in the same way as before or qualify under the new system.
Under the current system you must complete both the academic and vocational stages of training as well as meeting the character and suitability requirements to become a solicitor. The academic stage is achieved by either:
- a qualifying law degree
- a non law degree in a different subject and completing the Common Professional Examination
The vocational stage comprises:
- the Legal Practice Course
- a two year period of recognised training
- the Professional Skills Course
So what will qualifying look like for solicitors after 2020?
- having a degree or equivalent
- two stages of the SQE assessment
- having a two year period of work experience
- meeting the character and suitability requirements to become a solicitor
The SRA will be providing information and guidance about how to qualify in the new system. Watch their video for more information.
