A day in the life of... James Underwood, trainee, Russell-Cooke—Legal500 Future Lawyers

It’s 8.30am, and I’m walking across Waterloo Bridge. Russell-Cooke has three London offices–Bedford Row (in Holborn), Putney and Kingston–each with its own quirks and characteristics. The family team sits across all three, but I’m based in Bedford Row, an eighteenth-century, Grade II listed townhouse. Which is why, as I do every morning, I’m enjoying the views from Waterloo Bridge: Westminster to my left, St Paul’s and the City to my right. I don’t know it yet, but this will be the calmest part of my day. 

Settled at my desk with a cup of coffee, I check my emails and start to work out a plan for the day ahead. That soon becomes pointless when an urgent email comes in. A KC has referred a case to one of the partners, and it requires immediate action. Our soon-to-be client has just learned that his estranged wife is relocating with their two young children from Kent to Yorkshire. This is happening as I read the email, and not only has Father not been consulted, he doesn’t even know where in Yorkshire they’re headed. 

This will require three of us–partner, associate and trainee–to make an urgent, same-day application to the court to prevent the relocation. There are a few things I need to do, and I need to think carefully about the order in which I do them, but the clock is ticking. 

First I call the Father’s nearest court to find out the quickest way to get an urgent application to them. I then start calling around barristers’ chambers, as finding someone who can get from London to Kent instantly won’t be easy. As I wait for the clerks to get back to me, I draft a Notice of Acting (the court won’t let us do anything until we’ve formally confirmed we’re acting for the Father). 

Then I call a process server, which sounds like something to do with computers, but is actually the person you see on American legal dramas who dramatically springs court papers on unsuspecting recipients (it’s generally less dramatic in real life). The circumstances mean that the urgent hearing will be without notice (the Mother will not be told about it in advance), but if we get the court order we’re looking for then we’ll need to make sure Mother sees it one way or another. However, as we don’t actually know where Mother is going, the process server is a bit baffled as to what I’m asking him to do. I persist, and he eventually agrees to have one of his Yorkshire agents on standby for the day. 

By now I’ve managed to find a barrister willing to jump on the next train to Kent. I’ve done as much as I can at this stage–the application is with the associate and partner–so I go back to my inbox, which is feeling neglected. 

After lunch with the other trainees–there are 12 of us in my cohort, so there’s always a decent number around for lunch/a chat/a drink–I turn my attention to another matter which is not quite so urgent but nonetheless requires swift progress. One of the partners and I have met with a man whose elderly mother lacks capacity due to dementia. A decade ago she married a man from a Caribbean island, but they’ve never lived together and haven’t had contact for a few years now. For various reasons it makes sense for them to divorce, and her son wishes to be appointed as her ‘litigation friend’ so that he can act on her behalf. With capacity and jurisdiction issues involved, this is not a straightforward divorce. I research the process for appointing a litigation friend, and draft a detailed letter of advice dealing with this point as well as the complexities of jurisdiction and international service (my exasperated process server might get a trip to the Caribbean). 

After work, I join colleagues at a Bloomsbury bowling alley for a social with a set of family law barristers. I’ll go on to work with some of them in the coming weeks, so I hope they’ll remember the first game (which I win) but not the second (not my finest). 

I could say this hasn’t been a typical day, but it hasn’t been atypical either. Family law is fast-moving, unpredictable and highly varied, and it’s not uncommon for your plans to be waylaid by events. A busy but very fulfilling day draws to a close as I re-cross the Thames, now reflecting the lights of the South Bank. 

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