Helping Tip The Scales
100 years after Dr. Ivy Williams began her career as the first woman Barrister in England and Wales, women are still fighting against gender discrimination. Statistics collected from the Solicitors Regulation Authority illustrate just how far we have to go.
The idea of The Women in Law Society was conceived in March 2020. After attending, what we didn’t know at the time was, the last in person Legal Cheek event, where we heard “Legal Pioneers” talk about their journey in the law. Upon completing the obligatory and always awkward networking session with other students, my friends and I found ourselves shuffled into a corner with the same idea bouncing around in our minds.
My name is Ruqayyah, I am a third-year law student at City and one of three co-founders of the Women in Law Society. We started the group after coming to the conclusion that becoming lawyers wasn’t going to be as easy for us as it would for some of our colleagues. We are all women from working class backgrounds, we found that the information and the advice being offered to us, wasn’t for us.
The vision behind forming the society was to provide members with the information, skills and advice that is tailored to women looking to work in the law. The Solicitors Regulation Authority tells us that women make up just under half of the lawyers employed by a firm – women only make up 33% of partners in UK firms, 16% of QCs are women and only 38% of barristers are women. These are just a few examples of gender disparity in the legal sector.
When we started, there were three of us and a lot of people to convince that we were worth their time and the £5 membership fee (which for students is considered a small fortune). We knew that there would be people who doubted our society, they made their presence know fairly early on with disparaging and misogynistic comments, usually taking the form of “where is the Men in Law Society?”, to which we would remind them that it was actually called the Law Society or invited them to start their own society. This started to subside when we began hosting our online sessions, students started to see the passion and drive behind this society when it was being translated into events.
Our first event was a seminar with the brilliant, Kate Mahon – a barrister turned solicitor who ran her own all female law firm. She spoke about the work that she had done, the work she was doing and how she ended up with her own firm. We hadn’t expected so many people to show up but when 30 people joined us we were elated.
From there we launched our monthly “Women in Law Seminars”. These proved to be a hit among students and faculty at the university. Friends of ours, LinkedIn connections and mentors agreed to talk at these events and inspired many. One of my favourite instances was when we had invited secondary school and college students to join these sessions, our friend Rachida Benamar had agreed to talk for us. She was incredible, full of life and so vibrant, we were lucky and had a fantastic turnout. One of the year 9 students who attended even wrote an article detailing the experience.
It is truly a pleasure to be able to have bought these experiences to so many aspiring lawyers and law students, my friends and I are so lucky to have started this society at a time where it was really needed. We hope to continue this legacy past our third year and hopefully pass it down to some passionate Women in Law.
Ruqayyah Ahmed is a Law Student at City, University of London, Co-Founder of The Women in Law Society
Women in Law “Meet your Society” event