MIC Working with Businesses

Employers are given a short presentation, followed by a question and answer session, before going into court to see magistrates applying these skills in the daily work of the court. These sessions are designed to encourage employers to be supportive of employees who wish to become magistrates, and to highlight the importance of playing a part in their communities.

In an effort to try to get younger people into the magistracy we decided to start from the top and get employers on board. To do that we needed to persuade them that the benefits to them are significant, and outweigh the loss of an employee for 13 days a year. We wanted a hard hitting and professional power point presentation and so asked a small group of our bench who are full time employees to ‘brain storm’ one evening. They focused on the transferable skills and the training we get as magistrates, and based on their work we devised our presentation.

We bought a database of all the companies with work forces of over 100 employees and used this to invite the key decision makers to a ‘Breakfast Briefing’ at court. We have run two of these events and about 15 companies were represented at each. The format was a half hour presentation with 3 or 4 presenters – all of whom could expand on how being a magistrate had aided them in their business roles; followed by questions; then an hour or so in court observing the work done. This was the one aspect beyond our control and while we’d chosen what we hoped would be a busy Narey court, we dreaded the lawyers not being ready, or the defendants not turning up. We were lucky! We were also fortunate that magistrates who normally would not have time to become involved with MIC projects because they are in full time employment, were highly committed to this project and attended the breakfast meetings as presenters, or as ‘mentors’ to the employers during their time with us. As a result of these initiatives we have received applications form some of the employees

Recruitment is the other main area of MIC involvement. We work closely with our Advisory panel and this year have produced a county-wide campaign linking the MIC teams across the whole of Hertfordshire to stage our Open Evenings on the same nights, with the same format across the county. In order to benefit from the Inside Justice publicity, these first Open Evenings will take place during Inside Justice Week. This enables us to piggy-back their promotion, and save our costs. MIC teams run the ‘court work’ part of these evenings and there is never any shortage of magistrates volunteering to play the roles of lawyers and defendants.

"It would be easy for MIC work to become routine – schools, community groups, colleges. We have learned to try to reach beyond the obvious. The MIC team thrives because it recognises that, like the magistracy, it needs to be relevant, and fully engaged with our whole community."