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Leeds Legal

Essay competition

Leeds Legal is giving you the opportunity to win £1,000 plus a summer placement with a top Leeds law firm by taking part in an all-new essay competition.

Students at the University of Leeds, Leeds Metropolitan University and BPP Law School are being offered the chance to take part in the first-ever Leeds Legal Essay Competition.

Make your mark on the city’s top lawyers

Leeds Legal, an alliance of city law firms, is giving budding lawyers the opportunity to take part in the first-ever Leeds Legal Essay Competition.

All you have to do is wow a panel of judges with an essay on one of a series of nominated topical legal issues for the opportunity to win a cash prize and a summer placement.

Top Leeds Legal judges will be looking for a unique and inspired take on a topical legal issue, which provides a comprehensive and balanced legal argument.

The winning essay will be awarded £1,000 plus a two-week work summer placement at one of the city’s top law firms, including Lupton Fawcett, Pinsent Masons, Gordons, Irwin Mitchell or Shulmans Solicitors.

The runner-up will receive a cash prize of £250 plus a two-week work summer placement.  In addition, 3 runner-up essays, one from each of the University of Leeds, Leeds Metropolitan University and BPP Law School, will also win a two-week work summer placement at one of the city’s top law firms.

Essay topics

Simple – just choose from one of the following topical legal issues:

1. The Red Tape Burden on Business
The Government recently announced plans for a three-year freeze on the burden of red tape. This is due to come into effect in April 2010, barely two months before the last possible date for a General Election and would restrict the ability of a different government to implement new legislation, if they went along with it. There are many estimates around of what bureaucracy costs businesses but what is the real impact and is the burden likely to increase or reduce in the years ahead?  

2. Health and Safety at Work
Despite the improvement wrought by the Health & Safety at Work Act, 228 people were killed at work in the UK in 2007. That’s over four a week. This was slightly fewer than the number killed the previous year but it is likely that the downward trend has now reached a plateau. Is new legislation needed to make Britain’s workplaces even safer and, if so, what should it contain?  Alternatively, has ‘the nanny state’ now gone too far with health and safety courses on how to change a light bulb etc?

3. Compliance with Employment Legislation
Businesses have been complaining for years about the amount of new employment law and regulation, particularly emanating from the EU, and the costs of complying with it. But how much has the burden of compliance really increased on businesses and is it likely to be made more reasonable in the future, e.g. if the government changes?

4. The Surveillance Society
Following the fierce debates on the 42-day detention of terror suspects and ID cards, the Information Commissioner has said plans to give Government easier access to personal phone and internet information could feed vast official databases and be a step too far for the British way of life. He said people’s data, ranging from DNA records to car number plates, was being piled up without proper debate or justification.  How necessary are the additional powers the Government is proposing? Why is the UK population so closely watched, compared to people in other countries, and how is surveillance law likely to develop in the years ahead?   

5. Watching the Web
The law relating to the internet is a huge area of debate among lawyers at present and is evolving fast e.g. The Government has put the onus on entertainment companies to find a legal means of satisfying the demand for downloads and MPs have called for stronger self-regulation by the UK’s video game publishers and website owners. How well is law and regulation keeping up with the development of the internet and the information it makes available? What measures are desirable and likely in the years ahead? 

6. Privacy Damages
Formula One’s Max Moseley won a record £60,000 damages last year from the News of the World after it published claims with photos and video extracts, that he had participated in Nazi-themed sadomasochistic sex with five prostitutes. It is now expected he will bring a libel action against the papers and media organisations in France, Germany and Italy, which published images without his consent. A successful libel action would bring much higher damages. Is taking the privacy route, an approach now likely to be adopted widely by aggrieved litigants and, if so, what are the implications going to be for the media and for Society as a whole?

7. Insolvency Rules
The current insolvency laws in England and Wales seem to be regarded as increasingly out-of-date, given the increasingly complex nature of restructurings. Is David Cameron’s proposal to change the insolvency laws by drawing on the best aspects of the US Chapter 11 system, (to give companies more time to restructure by allowing more protection from creditors) the way forward? How well does the British system of administration work? Will it be possible to import the better aspects of Chapter 11 without bringing in the less desirable parts?

8. Pensions
The CBI has warned that excessive regulation is increasing the risk of final salary pension schemes being closed or bought out. A growing number of businesses are voicing alarm at the pressures being placed on defined benefit schemes. Accounting Standards Board proposals that would require companies to carry the worst case cost of pension liabilities on balance sheets, tougher mortality assumptions assumed by the regulator and a higher than expected levy proposed by the Pension Protection Fund have all added to the burden of providing a defined benefit pension.  

Are we really facing the potential death of the defined benefit pension scheme and, if so, what are the implications likely to be for the adequacy of retirement provision in the future? Is further legislation now needed to make it easier for providers to continue operating these schemes?  

The Rules

Before you go rushing off, just take a minute to check the rules:

Students must be studying undergraduate, postgraduate, GDP and LPC law course at Leeds Metropolitan University, University of Leeds or BPP Law School.

Entries are to be submitted on one of the provided essay topics by Monday 6 March (for University of Leeds students) and Monday 13 April 2009 (Leeds Metropolitan University and BBP students).
 
All entries need to be between 4000-5000 words in length of original work. 

Entries need to be presented in typed, 1½ line spaced copy in either Arial, Verdana or Times Roman size 12 font. Submissions can be printed or emailed.
 
Leeds Metropolitan University entries should be submitted to Terry Moran at Leeds Law School, 10 Quebec Street. Leeds, LS1 2HA, or emailed to t.moran@leedsmet.ac.uk. For further information please contact Terry on 0113 8126404.

University of Leeds entries should be submitted to Rachael Taylor at Room 203, 20 Lyddon Terrace, School of Law, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT, or emailed to lawrt@leeds.ac.uk. For further information please contact Rachael on 0113 3435010. 

BPP entries should be submitted Liz Smart at BPP Law School Leeds, Whitehall Quay, Leeds, LS1 4HG, or emailed to lizsmart@bpp.com. For further information please contact Liz on  0113 3868263.
 
The judges’ decision will be final and the results will be announced by 1 June 2009.

All rights to use the whole or any part of any of the entries submitted will remain with Leeds Legal for future promotional activity with author attribution.

Good luck!

Click here to download an entry form (pdf)
 
Calling all
Leeds law students ! Click here for
more information about
The Leeds Legal
Essay Competition

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