Law societyA law society is an association of lawyers with a regulatory role that includes the right to supervise the training, qualifications, and conduct of lawyers. Where there is a distinction between barristers and solicitors, solicitors are regulated by the law societies and barristers by a separate bar council. Much has changed for law societies in recent years, with governments in Australia, New Zealand, England, Wales, and Scotland creating government sponsored regulators for lawyers (both barristers and solicitors), leaving to law societies the role of advocacy on behalf of their members.
Scots lawScots law (Lagh na h-Alba) is the legal system of Scotland. It is a hybrid or mixed legal system containing civil law and common law elements, that traces its roots to a number of different historical sources. Together with English law and Northern Ireland law, it is one of the three legal systems of the United Kingdom. Early Scots law before the 12th century consisted of the different legal traditions of the various cultural groups who inhabited the country at the time, the Gaels in most of the country, with the Britons and Anglo-Saxons in some districts south of the Forth and with the Norse in the islands and north of the River Oykel.
Courts of England and WalesThe courts of England and Wales, supported administratively by His Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service, are the civil and criminal courts responsible for the administration of justice in England and Wales. Except in constitutional matters, committed to the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, the United Kingdom does not generally have a single unified legal system—England and Wales have one system, Scotland another, and Northern Ireland a third.
PupillageA pupillage, in England and Wales, Northern Ireland, Kenya, Malaysia, Pakistan and Hong Kong, is the final, vocational stage of training for those wishing to become practising barristers. Pupillage is similar to an apprenticeship, during which bar graduates build on what they have learnt during the Bar Professional Training Course or equivalent by combining it with practical work experience in a set of barristers' chambers or pupillage training organisation.
Legal Practice CourseThe Legal Practice Course (LPC) also known as the Postgraduate Diploma in Legal Practice is a postgraduate course and the final educational stage for becoming a solicitor in England, Wales and Australia (where it is commonly known as "practical legal training" or "PLT"). The course is designed to provide a bridge between academic study and training in a law firm. It is a one-year, full-time (or two-year, part-time) course, and tuition fees range from £8,000-£17,300 a year.
MagistrateThe term magistrate is used in a variety of systems of governments and laws to refer to a civilian officer who administers the law. In ancient Rome, a magistratus was one of the highest ranking government officers, and possessed both judicial and executive powers. In other parts of the world, such as China, a magistrate was responsible for administration over a particular geographic area. Today, in some jurisdictions, a magistrate is a judicial officer who hears cases in a lower court, and typically deals with more minor or preliminary matters.
Bar councilA bar council (Comhairle an Bharra) or bar association, in a common law jurisdiction with a legal profession split between solicitors and barristers or advocates, is a professional body that regulates the profession of barristers. In such jurisdictions, solicitors are generally regulated by the law society. In common law jurisdictions with no distinction between barristers and solicitors (i.e. where there is a "fused profession"), the professional body may be called variously a Law Society, Bar Council or a bar association.
County courtA county court is a court based in or with a jurisdiction covering one or more counties, which are administrative divisions (subnational entities) within a country, not to be confused with the medieval system of county courts held by the high sheriff of each county. County Court (England and Wales) Since 2014, England and Wales have had what is officially described as "a single civil court" named the County Court, with unlimited financial jurisdiction.
Bar (law)In law, the bar is the legal profession as an institution. The term is a metonym for the line (or "bar") that separates the parts of a courtroom reserved for spectators and those reserved for participants in a trial such as lawyers. In the United Kingdom, the term "the Bar" refers only to the professional organization for barristers (referred to in Scotland as advocates); the other type of UK lawyer, solicitors, have their own body, the Law Society. Correspondingly, being "called to the Bar" refers to admission to the profession of barristers, not solicitors.
TribunalA tribunal, generally, is any person or institution with authority to judge, adjudicate on, or determine claims or disputes—whether or not it is called a tribunal in its title. For example, an advocate who appears before a court with a single judge could describe that judge as "their tribunal." Many governmental bodies that are titled as "tribunals" are described so in order to emphasize that they are not courts of normal jurisdiction.
