Griffith College Dublin

BEST LECTURERS: Our courses are delivered by the best lecturers all of are practising lawyers, full profiles of our unrivalled team can be seen here.

ONLINE/DISTANCE LEARNING : Our distance-learning programme for the Kings Inns preparatory course has been developed in light of the needs of those students who are not in a position to attend lectures in Dublin. Each distance-learning student receives the full complement of study material at the beginning of the course and is assigned a course tutor who will correct the students homework on a weekly basis. Direct telephone and e-mail tutor support is provided. Distance-learning students are invited to attend lectures on campus in the first (orientation) and the final (exam review) weeks of the course.

FLEXIBILITY: Whereas online offers the ultimate in flexibility, we offer the same in respect of our live lectures. We have midweek courses at the Griffith College Campus on the South Circular Road (15 minute walk from Grafton Street).

ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY: Course content may be viewed  via iPad, iPhone, Android phone or laptop for further flexibility.

EXAM FOCUSSED COURSE MATERIAL AND GRIFFITH COLLEGE UNRIVALLED RESOURCES:  All manuals are updated on a constant basis to ensure that an up-to-the- minute analysis of the five subject areas are provided to include all new cases, amendments to the syllabus, changes in the examiners approach to asking questions as well as exam tip and techniques. At Griffith College each student enrolled on each subject receives a resource pack containing the subject syllabus and a bank of past examination papers.

All course material, lecture notes, additional cases provided during the course etc are available to our Kings Inns students on Moodle - our student intranet, also available are weekly homework schedules and subject discussion boards where you, your study colleagues and your lecturer can exchange information outside lecture hours.

CONTINUOUS SUPPORT: We work a continuous support system via our online services. Students have queries addressed bylecturers within a very short time period. To read more about these services go here.

This course prepares students for the Honorable Society of King's Inns annual entrance examinations. Focused tuition is provided in the five entrance examination subjects by some of the most popular and experienced lecturers in the country.

Overview of the course schedule: The programme for this year will run from June 10th 2013. 

Click here for the timetable

The first step in becoming a barrister is entrance into the Honourable Society of King‘s Inns in Dublin to study for a Barrister-at-Law degree. Participation in the Barrister-at-Law degree course is confined to

Participants must then pass entrance exams organised by the Society which are usually held in September.

Students in the one year full time degree course study subjects such as Conveyancing, Taxation, Administrative and Planning Law, Commercial Law, Practice and Procedure, CompetitionLaw, Advocacy, and Evidence. The Honourable Society of King’s Inns course structure includes lectures and tutorials, and students must attend an allocated number of dining sessions. They must also pass an oral and written examination in Irish before the degree of Barrister-of-Law can be conferred on them. A newly-qualified barrister must then spend a year’s pupillage (or devilling) with a junior counsel before they can start their own practice.

King‘s Inns students must be able to conduct a case in the Irish language and are therefore obliged to pass a written and oral Irish exam. In addition to passing the required exams, students must ‘keep commons‘, by dining in the Dining Hall at the King‘s Inns ten times in each academic year. Following successful completion of the barrister-at-law degree, the King‘s Inns graduate will be called to the Bar. The call to the Bar is a formal ceremony whereby a graduate is admitted to take their place in court and to practice as a junior counsel.

Following the call to the Bar, a barrister must spend at least one legal year as a pupil of an experienced barrister. This period is known as devilling, and the pupil barrister is known as a devil, while the experienced barrister is referred to as the master. During the pupil stage, the devil is required to assist their master in all aspects of their practice including court work, drafting court papers, and making court applications on behalf of their master‘s clients.

Life as a barrister
Barristers are professional advocates, who deal with court work at all levels of the legal system. They tend to have particular expertise in certain areas of law. Barristers must act as independent practitioners; they depend entirely on themselves for work and income. This is an essential difference between life at the Bar and life in a solicitor‘s office, although the role of the barrister as an advocate before the courts is still regarded as the main difference between the two professions. Barristers are governed by the Honourable Society of the King‘s Inns and the General Council of the Bar of Ireland.
Barristers are not allowed to take instructions directly from lay clients although in the case of contentious matters they are allowed to have preliminary consultations with clients once a solicitor is present. Barristers are largely dependent upon solicitors for work. The Code of Conduct of the Bar Council obliges a barrister to uphold the interests of his client ‘without regard to his own interests or any consequences to himself or any other person‘. Furthermore, written or oral communications between a barrister / solicitor and a client are legally privileged if made in the context of contemplated or pending litigation.
After some years as a junior counsel, a barrister may apply to the Chief Justice and Attorney General for admission to the Inner Bar (to become a Senior Counsel). A barrister is called to the Inner Bar by the Chief Justice in the Supreme Court, on the approval of the government. When accepted into the Inner Bar, the barrister is granted letters patent by the Government. This is known as "taking silk". A senior counsel takes precedence over junior counsel in court and wears a silk gown.
Another difference between junior and senior counsel is in the amount of payment they receive. The fee for a junior counsel is normally two-thirds of the fee charged by a senior counsel except where the latter is charging a special fee due to the length or difficulty of a particular case, in which case they are entitled to be paid more.

The Bar in Ireland
There are several thousand qualified barristers in Ireland, many of whom are employed in the public service and in industry. Approximately 2,000 are members of the Law Library with more than 1,750 working in Dublin and 100 based in Cork; a further 150 work on the court circuits outside Dublin and Cork. There are about 1,725 junior counsel and 275 senior counsel. The junior counsel becomes a senior counsel by applying “to take silk” usually after at least 15 years experience as a junior. If the application is approved by government, having already been considered by the Chief Justice and the Attorney General who liaise with the Chairman of the Bar Council, the barrister is called to the Inner Bar by the Chief Justice and becomes a senior counsel.

Senior counsel usually specialise in particular areas of the law and give more time to the preparation and presentation of cases in court and to providing specialist legal opinions. Senior counsel generally practice in the High Court and the Supreme Court.

For more information

For more details on how to become a barrister, please contact:
The Honorable Society of King‘s Inns
Henrietta Street
Dublin 1
Tel: + 353 1 874 4840
Fax: +353 1 8726048
email:info@kingsinns.ie
Web: www.kingsinns.ie

King's Inns' Application Form

Complete the application form here and send to

The Course Administrator,
Professional Law School,
Griffith College Dublin,
South Circular Road,
Dublin 8.

Fax: (01) 454 92 65
Email: proflaw@gcd.ie

Fees
The price per subject is €375 or €1,750 for tuition in all five subjects.

These fees are inclusive of all lectures, exam focused textbooks and resource packs.
Students are also entitled to avail of the Colleges extensive on-line law library with complementary access to Lexis Nexis , Westlaw UK and Westlaw.ie either from our extensive library and study rooms which are open seven days a week or via your home / office via Moodle, the Griffith College intranet

The fee for undertaking the course by distance-learning is €325 per subject or €1,500 for all five subjects.