Essex Court Chambers

Members of Essex Court Chambers are involved in a variety of initiatives for the furtherance of equality and diversity and promoting access to the legal profession and to the bar. Examples of these include:

The Social Mobility Foundation 

For the last five years, Essex Court Chambers has been an official supporter of the Social Mobility Foundation, and a large number of members of Chambers are regularly involved in running workshops and activities for students identified by the Social Mobility Foundation. Essex Court Chambers was the first (and still the only) chambers to become an official supporter of the Social Mobility Foundation. One of the key focuses of the Social Mobility Foundation is to support talented students from non-traditional backgrounds to focus on both thinking about careers and university choices whilst at school, and to support students in these endeavours. Supporting the Social Mobility Foundation came as part of a recognition by members of chambers that more needs to be done, far earlier in the recruitment process, and with a long term focus: supporting talented students to achieve their potential at school and university, enabling them to be the barristers of the future. Members of Chambers run at least four events per year with the Social Mobility Foundation, including a public speaking workshop for sixth form students, a mooting workshop for students at university, attending the Social Mobility Foundations career events, giving feedback on draft personal statements for university law degree applications, and providing mock university law interviews.

Mentoring Scheme

Essex Court Chambers is one of six Barristers’ Chambers who created a mentoring scheme for underrepresented groups at the Bar. The mentoring scheme, aims to support and encourage individuals from groups which are underrepresented at the Bar of England and Wales (and in particular the commercial bar) to pursue careers as barristers. Those underrepresented groups include women; people from minority ethnic backgrounds; people with disabilities; LGBT+ people; people who spent time in care; and people from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds.

Outreach

Outreach to potential candidates to widen the pool of potential applicants, for instance sponsoring QMUL's diversity event, providing speakers or participants to student events, providing mentors for students as part of the KCL Bar & Mooting Society’s Social Mobility Mentors Scheme, putting on student open days, assisting with the Bar Council’s Bar Placement Week, participating in the Inner Temple’s Pegasus Access and Support Scheme. In 2019, one of our current pupils, Lorraine Aboagye, spoke as a panelist for BME Legal, which caters to aspiring barristers from a black/minority and/or low socio-economic background, providing support, one-to-one mentoring and workshops on the pupillage process. The event was a workshop on networking tips and tricks, and general pupillage application advice.

COMBAR

Assisting with the work of COMBAR, the specialist bar association for the commercial bar, which has recently been supporting a series of diversity events with ‘Cake and Counsel’ in Birmingham and London with an emphasis on informal networking with aspiring lawyers. Several members of chambers are involved in COMBAR’s governance, and Bibek Mukherjee is a member of the Junior COMBAR Committee.

Annual Student Open Day

Essex Court Chambers led the way in introducing an annual student open day, in addition to traditional mini-pupillages, as a way of running an event specifically focused on giving students an opportunity to learn about the different areas of the bar and the routes to the bar, the available scholarships and financial support and where they are encouraged to freely ask questions and meet current members of Chambers. This annual event has proved very popular, including attracting many students not yet studying law and attracting equal numbers of male and female students.

Pro Bono

Members of Chambers regularly undertake pro bono work, including via the Bar Pro Bono Unit and the Employment Law Appeal Advice Scheme (“ELAAS”). Notable pro bono cases undertaken by members of Chambers include appearing in the Supreme Court in (1) Jivraj v Hashwani, in which the Supreme Court held that an arbitrator was not a person “employed” within the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003; and (2) Bates van Winkelhof v Clyde & Co LLP, in which the Supreme Court held that members of limited liability partnerships are workers for the purposes of whistleblowing protection. Further information on pro-bono work undertaken by members of Essex Court Chambers can be found on individual members’ CVs. In addition to arguing cases pro bono, many members of Essex Court Chambers are individually involved in supporting charitable causes, including working with legal advice clinics and acting as trustees. In 2019 Essex Court Chambers was acknowledged as a Gold Patron of the Bar Pro Bono Unit.