NQ blog - November 2016: Making the most of a variety of cases and places

I have been doing a fair bit of travelling recently, representing clients in different courts in various types of cases, which has made for an extremely busy, interesting and challenging few weeks.

Last week, I had the opportunity to stay overnight in Fort William for a children's panel on Wednesday and for court (referral) proceedings for the same client on Thursday.

The case is civil in nature but has a criminal background involving a High Court conviction and relates to the client's baby, which was taken from her at the hospital bed by the Social Work Department who obtained a child protection order. The facts of the case are particularly sad and harrowing but it is a very interesting case to get to grips with from a legal standpoint.

Additionally, we have a large agency base at my firm, mainly in the area of civil litigation. I have recently been instructed to cover cases for principal agents in a number of different courts. This is a great opportunity to appear in a variety of civil cases ranging from contested motions, to options hearings, to peremptory diets to proofs etc. It is great advocacy experience and I always welcome the opportunity to hone my advocacy skills.

As well as this, I am dealing with a large number of criminal cases at the moment.  Again, within the past few weeks, I was instructing solicitor within the High Court in Glasgow in a very interesting drugs case. In between my court appearances have been trips to police offices and prisons, all in addition to the time spent in the office doing paperwork and meeting clients!

It's a constantly on-the-go job but it never fails to amaze me how interesting it can be from one day to the next.