Alongside this responsibility, the Inns also have a role in administering disciplinary tribunals to deal with more serious complaints against barristers.
The role of the Council is to determine the requirements for admission, to approve law courses and practical legal training providers, and to assess the qualifications of overseas practitioners.
[6] For studies at an Inn an applicant needs to provide a comprehensive A-level, a good educational background, and an unblemished reputation.
During three years of education a student needs to pass two main exams: The first part is theoretical, which university graduates usually are spared.
They make speeches in front of the court, they write briefs, they give legal advice, and they provide expert opinion for difficult cases.
followed by a one-year Legal Practice Course and then, assuming the examinations have been passed, are employed for two years as trainee solicitors, a form of apprenticeship until about 1990 called articled clerk.
A solicitor stays in direct contact to their clients and gives them personal legal advice.
Dealing with conveyancing as well as trust businesses, developing last wills, and administrating estates are parts of solicitors' practice.
Profitable real estate businesses makes over 50% of the solicitor's income [citation needed].
The English legal system requires judges, except for the honorary Justices of the peace at magistrates courts, to first practise for several years as a barrister or solicitor with a good reputation.
[9] In general the Director of Public Prosecutions gives advice to police and other law enforcement agencies and is not a political civil servant.
They qualify after studying for the CILEX Professional Qualification (CPQ), a vocational route into the legal profession, open to those with or without a university degree or equivalent qualification/experience.
Unlike solicitors they are specialists and are qualified to practise solely in their chosen area of specialism.
CILEX Lawyers operate equally alongside solicitors as authorised persons, the only difference being the specialist rather than general scope of their practising certificate and their qualification route.
CILEX Lawyers can become partners in law firms, coroners, judges or advocates in open court.