Now then, if you want to become a magistrate then you've certainly come to
the right place.
My name's Richard McMunn, and for this short presentation
I'm going to give you some very important tips that will help you complete
a successful magistrate application form.
Now first of all one of the most important things to consider is "Is this job
for you?"
Because as you can imagine, many people apply to become a magistrate
without actually giving it some careful consideration, cause I'm sure
you fully appreciate the role is extremely important in society and with
that naturally comes a high degree of responsibility.
So there are a number of key important facts that
you need to understand before you even think about applying.
Why is it important?
Well basically because you will be assessed against
your level of commitment during the selection process; and that's not just
on the application form but also during the first interview.
Now the basic levels of commitment for becoming a magistrate
involves 26 half days sitting per year, some reasonably substantial
initial and then continuation training.
Also attending the occasional bench meeting with other
magistrates.
Now the 26 half day sittings per year may seem to be not that
much, you might on first appearance say yes that's OK I can easily manage
26 half day sittings but, the reality is that is quite a level of
commitment so I would seriously sit down, speak to your family about this
level of commitment and also you need to make sure that your employer, if
you are still employed, will give you permission and allow you to leave so
that you can actually achieve the basic level and remember it's just the
basic level of commitment.
The second part is some reasonably substantial initial training you will go
through an initial training period and then obviously in terms of
continuous professional development you will have to go through a series of
continuation training seminars and then obviously attending the occasional
bench meeting.
So there are some other factors that you should also
consider, first of all its important that you stick with the dates that you
will have agreed in advance as though as when you will attend court, you
should only ever cancel your sitting at the last moment in a real
emergency.
Because as you can imagine the court must still run, and
replacement magistrates are not always available at short notice.
Any cancelled sittings, you will need to make
them up, or obviously you don't want to cancel sittings as previously mentioned
unless its a real emergency.
Now obviously there will be some cases that go part heard
through to another day, you may need to come back to court for an extra
sitting and also contested hearings that last for more than half a day and
maybe even possible several days.
There will be various special hearings of various kinds.
There will also be the wider contributions you might care to
make to the role, for example sitting on bench committees, year full family
work or sitting on appeals at the crown court, and becoming a mentor or
an appraiser of a JP colleague or two.
So those are really important factors to consider.
Now the selection process itself consists of an application
form, once you get through the application form part, you will go to a first
interview, first interview, then a second interview and then finally checks
and references, and your appointment where you will go on to training.
Now the whole process can take 12 months to complete, it can actually
take somewhat longer.
I know some people who've been waiting for 18 months,
so you obviously need to have a degree of patience, because this can
take a long time so be aware of that from the offset.
Now the 6 key qualities are essential and you must be able to demonstrate
these, not just on the application form but also during every single stage
of the selection process, you must be of good character, it goes without
saying, but you must be of good character, you must be able to understand
people, you must be able to understand society, understand the people that
you are dealing with and that you are judging on.
You must also be an effective communicator, you must have social
awareness and that basically means having an awareness of what's going
on in the community in which you're serving as a magistrate, because if
you don't understand the community and the society.
Then how can you judge and how can you give a balanced view and opinion on
things?
You obviously have to be mature and you must be of sound
temperament, you must be able to give sound judgment and also as previously
stated a level of commitment and reliability.
Now the scoring criteria for becoming a magistrate, well basically good
character and commitment will be assessed as either demonstrated or not demonstrated,
so there's no shades of grey with these, you need to give these
2 direct consideration, you either have those or you don't, obviously
if you don't then you won't progress through to the next stage.
Now the other 4 qualities are scored and assessed as follows.
Level 0 is basically that you didn't demonstrate them with little or no
positive evidence.
level one means that it was demonstrated generally positive, level two means that it was well
demonstrated and you provided positive evidence, level three means that
it was very well demonstrated, very strong evidence provided and the key
word in all of that is "evidence".
Being able to show evidence of where you match each individual
area that is being assessed.
So how would you do that?
well basically on the application form during the first interview,
you would need to provide detail of each specific area so if the panels
that you do in the first interview provide us with details of how you
are socially aware.
What have you done to make sure that you are socially
aware?
You could come back and provide evidence of where you have actually
worked in the community.
Now that might be working at a school event, at a charity day, or maybe
even work in a charity shop, giving up your time for say an hour during the
weekends.
Just on that points of working in the community I strongly
advise that you get some form of experience of working in community,
because then you will understand the needs and the problems within society
that you're going to be assessing people on.
Okay for some more tips please visit the website www.magistrateapplication.co.uk.
Thank you very much for listening.