Frustrations of Being a Magistrate: Episode 6: Death by Online Training

It is important for Magistrates to attend the regular refresher and update training sessions that are on offer.

The Justices' Training, Approvals, Authorisations and Appraisals Committee (JTAAAC) is responsible for ensuring every that every Magistrate is correctly qualified, experienced and competent to perform their role in the Adult and, where applicable, the Youth Courts.

If a Magistrate fails to attend essential training then sooner or later the JTAAAC will notice and questions will be asked of their competence to continue in the role. Ultimately a Magistrate can be removed from the bench if they fail to fulfill their mandatory training obligations.

In my experience there are several opportunities to attend training courses, which are delivered at various times during the week in an effort to accommodate everyone.

I am one of those people who quite enjoys training. Not only is it a great opportunity to catch up on the latest legal and procedural developments, but it is also a chance to catch up with friends and colleagues I may not have seen for several months. As someone from an academic background, I would also consider myself a pretty diligent learner.

Since the start of the covid-19 pandemic, virtually every aspect of training has been delivered online via Microsoft Teams. Touch wood, covid-19 is now on the decline and virtually every other face-to-face aspect of the court's work has resumed, but a lot of training is still delivered via Teams. I consider that pretty unsatisfactory, despite the generally high quality of online training provided.

I am quite comfortable attending Teams training sessions, but I am sure there are many colleagues who might not be. For all we live in a digital age, I still have colleagues - very experienced, capable and well respected colleagues - who recoil in terror at the idea of using a laptop on the bench. Others, as in my case, may well value the social interaction of training as highly as they do the learning.

So why then, when every other corner of life has seemingly overcome the barriers of covid-19, are we still doing training courses online? I think the reason is two-fold.

Firstly, as I have previously mentioned, there is a lot more regional co-operation within HMCTS. Ten years ago, you'd attend a course and you'd know all the other delegates from your court and those nearby; today you attend a course and many of the delegates sit at courts 100+ miles from your own. Logistically it is easier to get everyone sat behind a computer screen, rather than to travel to some centralised location. You can also get a lot more pairs of eyes looking at a computer screen than you can in an actual training room.

Secondly, as is often the case, it is cheaper to deliver training remotely due to economies of scale and zero travel and subsistence expenses.

Either way I consider online training the second best option. Face-to-face, in person training is definitely my preference. I hope it returns in the not too distant future.