Pre-application judicial education programme (PAJE)
The Bar is more diverse than the judiciary and we know judicial diversity, particularly amongst salaried judges, is still an issue. The Judicial Diversity Forum (which includes the Bar Council) has been working on this.
The Pre-Application Judicial Education (PAJE) programme has been developed by the Judicial Diversity Forum to support those from groups under-represented in the judiciary (although we recommend all prospective judicial candidates consider the basic programme based on our judgecraft syllabus).
A range of resources are available, created by the Judicial College. They are available to any lawyer, irrespective of their professional background and whether they come from a group under-represented in the judiciary.
Some of the PAJE online resources are supported by a course of judge-led discussion groups. As space on these courses is limited, the majority of places are currently reserved for those from groups under-represented in the judiciary (BAME, women, those with a disability and/or lawyers from a non-litigation background), though it is possible that there may sometimes be spaces for those not in these under-represented groups.
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The judge-led element of PAJE consists of 4 discussion groups (a course) covering content in Judgecraft (2 x 2-hour discussion groups), Judicial Ethics (1 x 2-hour discussion group; and Equality & Diversity (1 x 2-hour discussion group).
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Judge-led courses will be supported (administered) by one of the three professional bodies (Law Society, Bar Council or Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx). Participants at each course will be a mix of barristers, solicitors and legal executives.
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A judge-led course (all 4 discussion groups) will take between 4 to 8 weeks to complete with groups run either weekly or fortnightly.
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Participants will sign up for an entire judge-led course and will be expected to attend all 4 discussion groups in order to complete the course.
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Judge-led courses will be run across England & Wales. Dates and venues (likely to be law firm offices and chambers located close to court centres or the offices of the professional bodies) will be advertised on the Judicial College website.
Read further information about attending one of these groups, or email PAJE@judiciary.uk to find out more.