As hundreds of aspiring lawyers prepare to sit the Solicitors Qualifying Examination this month, solicitors have raised concerns over whether the centralised assessment will meet its objective in opening up the profession.

The SQE was discussed at a Westminster Legal Policy Forum conference on legal education and training yesterday. 

The centralised assessment was introduced by the Solicitors Regulation Authority in 2021 with two objectives. The first was to provide greater assurance of consistent, high standards at the point of admission. The second was to develop new and diverse pathways to qualification, responsive to the changing legal services market and promote a diverse profession by removing artificial barriers.

Julie Swan, the SRA’s director of education and training, told the conference that it was early days but the SQE ‘is becoming well embedded and functioning well’.

Pass rates under the 'legacy' LPC route varied from 100% to 23% in 2019, Swan said. ‘We could not be sure consistent standards were being applied by all the providers. If we had different providers setting different standards, that would be unfair for students.'

With the SQE, aspiring lawyers are assessed in the same way, to the same standards, by a single assessment organisation, Swan said. Anyone concerned SQE would lower standards were ‘probably by now assured’.

However, speakers in the following panel discussion highlighted concerns.

In-house solicitor Lizzy Lim, a Law Society council member for junior lawyers, said: ‘We have concerns about the impact the SQE will have on developing diverse ways into the profession. Some have been flagged – for example, how accessible it is in terms of costs for those from a lower socio-economic background, with the cost of SQE constantly increasing and prep courses becoming increasingly mandatory.’

Solicitor Dana Denis-Smith, founder of the Next 100 Years project, said people from poorer backgrounds needed faster routes to earning money.

Denis-Smith was worried about the rates of failure among socially mobile people. 'We're putting them on a very slow lane. [SQE] is becoming embedded in the legal profession as the route into qualifying. We have very much started firing the gun at very different points on the track and that means very different end points. I do not think we will end up with a more diverse legal profession if we do not do something quite different to this system,' she said.

More than 7,000 people have so far taken at least one SQE assessment and 4,000 people will sit exams this month.

 

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