Twice as nice?

31 March 2006

Dual qualification will undoubtedly make a lawyer more marketable within what is becoming an increasingly competitive profession. Globalisation raises the demands placed upon lawyers’ expertise, and being dual qualified self-evidently increases this. Seeking admission to either of the bars of New York or California is the most popular route for UK-qualified lawyers looking for a dual qualification. This is partly because lawyers qualified in NY and California often use their qualifications to practice outside the US. Large numbers work in the London or European offices of US law firms, for example. Others work in UK law firms, principally in Legal 500 offices. Still others work in-house for large corporations.

UK eligibility

UK lawyers are attracted by the fact that once a candidate passes the NY or CA bar exam then admission to practice follows, without any necessity for a pupillage or training contract, and is unrestricted on any grounds of nationality or residence. LLB graduates have a tremendous advantage in that most of them are immediately eligible to sit the bar exam in New York. Most solicitors and barristers admitted in England & Wales are eligible to sit the California bar exam.

Of course many UK lawyers take the NY or CA bar exams because they want the opportunity to work in the US. Subject to work permit rules, often simply requiring a job offer from a US firm, qualification in either state can be a life- and career-changing experience. New York, for example, is a pre-eminent global legal services-providing jurisdiction. Working there furthers a lawyer’s intellectual and professional development in a uniquely energising environment. On the other hand, law practice in the great cities of the West Coast, San Francisco and Los Angeles, has a Pacific Rim perspective found nowhere else.

Prestige attraction

UK lawyers and law graduates who have been admitted to NY or CA often say that one of the principal motivating factors in their decision to take the exam was the prestige – particularly internationally – associated with admission to either of those jurisdictions. Many also report back that admission to practice in either jurisdiction opened unexpected professional doors for them. Career horizons are expanded – the UN has been known to recruit NY qualified lawyers as that is where its legal department is situated; lecturing in university law schools in the US or elsewhere is a real possibility; consultancy becomes an option and so on – the list is limited only by a lawyer’s imagination.

Qualifying in the UK

Naturally, dual qualification is by no means limited to UK lawyers and over recent years there has been a marked increase in the numbers of overseas lawyers from many jurisdictions around the world seeking to qualify as a solicitor of England and Wales. The means by which this is accomplished is through the Qualified Lawyers Transfer Test (QLTT). This is the conversion test that enables certain lawyers to qualify as solicitors in England and Wales. Those lawyers eligible to sit the test must be qualified in jurisdictions that are recognised by the Law Society or must be barristers qualified to practise in England and Wales. The growth in demand for the QLTT has led to the development of examination centres across the world and includes the US, India and the Commonwealth Caribbean.

In the UK the QLTT may be taken in London and Glasgow.

“Globalisation” has placed increased demands upon the expertise of the law offices around the world and the necessity for dual qualified lawyers may become the rule rather than the exception.

• If you would like to find out more about the dual qualification routes discussed in this article, please contact the Professional Qualifications Division at CLT on 0121 362 7735 or email americanbarregistrar@centlaw.com.

Paul Whitehouse is a director of specialist programmes at CLT