Advocacy practice assessment

The day I had been dreading finally arrived on Wednesday, the practice assessment for advocacy. I didn't actually feel too apprehensive in the days leading up however, come Wednesday morning I was a bag of nerves and very eager to get it over and done with. 

I met my opponent outside the interview room and luckily remembered to jot down his surname so that I could introduce him correctly. Unfortunately, his name was rather difficult to pronounce and I spent the next 10 minutes prior to entering the room repeatedly asking how to pronounce it - I am sure this came off as extremely rude but I hope he could see how nervous I was!

The hallway was filled with anxious students, some jabbering away, some quietly reading through notes, some wearing suits, others (like me) in their usual uni get-up. My pair was the last to get called in. Luckily the woman taking our assessment was my Tax teacher and I was grateful for the familiarity. She spent a couple of minutes chatting to us and I felt thoroughly calm by the time she pressed the timer and I had to begin. (In retrospect, it may have been better not to have had this prior chatting as, in the real assessment, you are treated as having begun the assessment as soon as you enter the room and should treat the room/assessor as you would a courtroom/judge). 

My intro was a little shaky and I forgot a few things I wanted to say, albeit nothing vital. After I had the introduction of the parties and the application out of the way I regained the flow I had had in the practices I had done at home and the whole thing seemed to whiz by. 

The 'show and tell' section (in which you are required to take the judge through the bundle, showing the relevant parts and telling how they strengthen your client's case etc) was my weakest part. This was mainly due to the fact I left out a large part of the respondent's evidence on the basis that I thought if it weakened my case it was best left for them to bring up. As I found out, it is necessary to address this evidence and try and put a positive spin on it in light of your client's case. Obviously I have used this technique before but thought, with only 10 minutes to make my case, it would be best focussing on all of our evidence and leaving the dissection of theirs to the full trial! Whoops!

My opponent had a very strong start but slowly began to unravel and I felt extremely uncomfortable for him, as I am sure he felt the same during my weaker points. Eventually he abandoned the 'show and tell' and moved on to a rather persuasive summary. 

Either way we were both found to be competent, and luckily not on the borderline. We were both told that our 'show and tell' was the weaker part of our advocacy, we both had felt it. After examining our notes, I was told that mine could be annotated a little more without risking a fail and that his were too annotated, bordering on breaching the NO SCRIPTS rule.

To be honest, the whole experience wasn't nearly as terrifying as I thought it would be and those 10 minutes flew by. The real assessment is on 18 December and we get our case notes on 2 December. I am hoping to get an application for security for costs again but there is a chance I will be given summary judgment. 

Some good advice our assessor gave us was to only have a brief read through of the papers when you get them. That way, when you come back to them in a week or so time you will have remembered in your head only the key issues i.e. those issues you are introducing as the relevant issues to be decided. 

Anyway, no other news this week. I hope everyone else's practice assessments are going well.