Light My Fire: Youth Judicial Initiatives
By Judge Nawraz Karbani, First-tier Tribunal Judge of the Immigration and Asylum Chamber (UK)
Presenting before a Year 8 secondary school history class, our assignment was to defend one of Richard III’s courtiers accused of his murder. Almost completely fictional, but nonetheless standing before the class, my first attempt at cross-examination struck a chord. Its reverberations never quite went away. Hearing your winning argument repeated back to you in the verdict, validating your thinking, logic, and articulation, was satisfying. I still itch to ask questions but now have to filter them through a judicial lens: is it relevant, appropriate, am I stepping off the bench? Acquiring a taste for the intellectual gymnastics that follow a deep argument or complex appeal, especially when you have to defend the weaker side, the underdog, the improbable, the impossible. And who doesn’t enjoy being right, right?
Law is quite unlike medicine, accountancy, teaching, or any other traditional profession to which students might be encouraged to aspire from an early age. It’s not typically something you will experience until someone especially arranges it for you. Doctors you will have met when you are ill or need immunizations. Numbers you will probably have encountered through your weekly shop or saving up for that special something. Teachers, you would hope, go without saying. Even those who might be exposed to early litigation, either through family proceedings or the less likely scenario of being a witness in a criminal trial, will do so through the most protected means, several times removed. It will perhaps be a letter through a guardian explaining how much you would like to see a parent and what activities you have enjoyed doing with them, or a pre-recorded interview with specialist police to be later played in court.
Thus, the importance of an age-appropriate introduction to the legal profession and judges is mostly left to chance and passing comments in the news. Brief insights into what can, in fact, be and will continue to be the democratic and legal parameters already impacting your life. With all the accompanying social noise and politics that now surround such stories, among confidentiality clauses or reporting restrictions, it is hard to discern the nub of the lawyer’s role. That nuanced steer that might have taken place in the background by a professional litigator.
Thinking back on those delicate times when you form your interests and explore your natural abilities, having some structured introductions to the legal system and profession is crucial. There is a responsibility to inspire the best and the brightest to aim to learn, train, and ultimately uphold one of the fundamental pillars of society. Encouraging those from minority backgrounds and the underprivileged takes even more time and effort, which is fundamental to the mirror-like reflection of diversity we should look for in the judiciary.
Experienced through mock trials, short presentations about the legal profession, and networking events from magistrates, legal academics, practicing lawyers, and judges, I am always reminded of how little of your time it can take to give someone an insight into the legal world and pay it forward. Never seek to underestimate how quickly that spark of interest can be lit in young minds.