LEGAL EDUCATION AND PROFESSION IN ENGLAND AND WALES

Abstract

For the last 30 years of the formation of the independent Ukrainian state, we have been in permanent search of the optimal model of organizing the training of lawyers and ensuring their honest and impartial work for the benefit of the state and citizens. In order to build our own concept that allows us to achieve the stated goals, we try to use the experience of those states that have successfully coped with this task. There is no doubt that the United Kingdom is considered a well-known authority in the educational and legal spheres. That is why the authorsʼ aim is to study the experience of England and Wales regarding the organization of the education of law school students and the work of professionals in the legal field in order to determine those principles and approaches that can be adopted by our educational and professional institutions. Taking this into account, the main task became the research and coverage of the following issues: types of professions that exist in the legal field; conditions of access to legal practice; mechanisms for selecting applicants for study in law schools; approaches to the formation of practical skills in future professionals; entities that have the greatest influence on the development of policy in the field of training lawyers; the tuition fee in law schools; the main challenges and trends in the development of the legal profession in the near future. In the first part of the article, the authors listed the legal professions, taking into account the division into regulated and other, and revealed the content of those professions that are not typical for Ukraine. In addition, considerable attention was paid to the peculiarities of university and non-university access to practical legal activity. Also, the authors did not ignore the provisions regarding the curriculumʼs content of training lawyers and defined the list of knowledge and skills that they try to form in future lawyers during their studies. However, the second part of the article is devoted to highlighting the issues of organizing professional activity and the role of professional associations in it, as well as determining the factors that will influence the further transformation of the profession in the near future. In addition, special attention in the work is devoted to the possibilities of work and training of Ukrainian lawyers who are currently in the United Kingdom due to the war. According to the results of the research, the authors of the article identified a number of principles and approaches that distinguish the English system of training lawyers and the organization of professional activity, which, in their opinion, should be taken into account in our country: constant monitoring and publication of all data related to legal education and legal activity in the form of as separate statistical data, especially with the formation of relevant complex reports; unifying the efforts of the government, legal scholars and representatives of professional communities to develop an effective and balanced approach to the development and functioning of the legal sphere; separation of theoretical training and practical training of future lawyers; emphasis on the development of law schools as powerful research centers, staffed by professionals who are respected experts in their field, and are often engaged by both the state and the private sector for consultation and support of practical activities; careful selection of applicants for university studies; increased attention to issues of integrity, both in the academic and professional communities, where proven cases of misconduct permanently makes it impossible for an individual to work in the legal field.