De Montfort University students share mooting success with the Kavanagh QCs and Ally McBeals of tomorrow

March 2002

Young would-be lawyers have been getting a helping hand from De Montfort University Law students and practising their legal skills in a unique competition. 

Moots are mock legal trials involving teams of two students role-playing lawyers in court putting forward their arguments in front of a judge. They form an important part of academic legal education. 

The De Montfort Law School student mooting teams have had so much success in mooting competitions against other universities, they are now passing on their skills to pupils across the East Midlands. 

The new venture by the Law School – The Schools and Colleges Mooting Competition, sees its first final take place this week.

Over 50 students have entered the competition from the following schools and colleges: Loughborough High School; Leicester High School; Lutterworth Grammar; Wyggeston QEI; West Notts College (Mansfield); Leicester Grammar; Southfields School for Girls in Kettering; and Arthur Mellows Village College in Glinton, Cambridgeshire. 

All will benefit from the experience of the De Montfort University student mooters who have beaten teams from Nottingham, Warwick, Nottingham Trent and Staffordshire Universities. 

The Schools and Colleges Mooting Competition was introduced in January at Law Club (an initiative the University has run for local sixth formers for the past eight years). The competitors took part in workshops on mooting skills and attended a demonstration moot conducted by DMU students and judged by Martin Davis, a lecturer in the Law School who has co-written one of the leading textbooks in contract law. 

Each mooting team is given a fictional legal case, with one student taking the part of senior barrister and the other the junior barrister. Each barrister is given a different legal point to put forward and has 10 minutes to present the case for their client. One team will argue for the claimant, the other for the defendant.

All moots in the competition are on the topic of offer and acceptance in the law of contract and a judge conducts proceedings and ask the barristers questions. The mock trial is in the appeal court so no-one plays the parts of witnesses, jury or any court personnel. 

First and second round moots took place during February, judged by academic members of the Law School, and the competition is now hotting up for the final stage. The runners-up are: Clare Fletcher and Tom Leppard from Arthur Mellows Village College near Peterborough; and Ruth Kelly and Claire Lynch from Loughborough High School. 

The final will take place on Tuesday 5 March at De Montfort Law School, Elfed Thomas Building, Leicester city campus, and the finalists are: Joe Webster (formerly of Wyggeston QEI and currently on a gap year) and Paul Murphy from West Notts College in Mansfield; and Kaajal Chandrasingh and Anisha Chauhan from Leicester High School. 

The evening will begin at 6.30pm with a talk by Brian Stone of the Legal Services Commission in Nottingham speaking on ‘Can ordinary people afford to go to law?’ After a short break for refreshments the final of the mooting competition will take place at 7.30pm, lasting 50 minutes to an hour. It will be judged by Professor Richard Card and Martin Davis.

Professor Richard Ward, Head of the Department of Law, said: "We’re delighted with the interest these young students have in learning about the law and developing advocacy skills. We have been very impressed by the high standard achieved by the students in this competition, some of whom have not previously studied Law." 

For further information on the Mooting Competition, please contact Fran Collins on (0116) 250 6369, or email fcollins@dmu.ac.uk