Starting a law career can be hard work, but it has the promise of a long and rewarding working life where you will get to see all kinds of interesting cases and make a good living. For some people in law, being a solicitor or other legal expert is also a chance to help people who have been the victims of crime, corporate negligence or malpractice. Lawyers can also have an important part to play in a lot of the issues that affect normal people in the course of their lives, especially when it comes to things like family law and property law.
If you prefer the idea of working to support ordinary members of the public at difficult times in their lives, as opposed to working on the legal side for a corporation or working in criminal law, then here are three possible specialisms that may be interesting to you:
Family And Marriage Law
For a lot of people, the only times when they really need to employ a lawyer are when they have unpleasant situations in their lives – often relating to their spouse or family. Divorce law can be an area where a lot of lawyers find the work satisfying, as they are able to help their clients sort out the legal side of what is usually a very difficult and painful part of their lives, helping them to negotiate a settlement and be able to move on.
This area of law can also include things like child custody, so if you are someone who cares a lot about families and children and wants to help ensure the best outcomes for the people who come to you, this can be a good specialism. Family law is also one of the most in-demand fields because it is something that affects people from all walks of life and in all regions, so if you prefer to work somewhere outside of major cities, it can also be a good area to focus on.
Medical Negligence and Malpractice Law
Another field you may want to consider if you like helping people is medical negligence. People make medical negligence claims UK for a lot of reasons – it could be that they were prescribed the wrong drug, were the victim of a botched surgery, or even that they were not properly looked after during pregnancy or childbirth and this led to health issues for their baby.
Medical negligence covers a broad range of situations, and claims can be against the NHS or private practitioners. The best medical negligence solicitors work to secure compensation for people who have seen any kind of injury or negative outcome due to medical professionals not providing the accepted and expected standard of care and treatment, and these compensation claims can often be of a very high value. Also, due to the nature of some firms this can be a very personal side of the law, as they offer free over the phone advice to each potential client – which can be seen through the UK company The Medical Negligence Experts who provide a very personal one-on-one approach which some firms don’t.
Medical negligence lawyers not only help their clients to move on with their lives after a bad experience and fund any further surgery they need or cover any loss of earnings or lifestyle through compensation, but they also have an impact on medical care as a whole. The more bad practices that are brought to light through a medical negligence claim, the better the healthcare industry becomes, as practices seek to avoid lawsuits and regulatory bodies learn more about the areas where tighter controls are needed to protect patients.
Medical malpractice can, therefore, be an ethically rewarding field, as well as an interesting and lucrative one.
Personal Injury
Personal injury claims can be brought against individuals, companies, and even government bodies in some cases. Personal injury can cover a vast range of things, from workplace injury to people being injured in public places due to negligence (for example, inadequate warning signs). Where it can be proven that the injury was the fault of somebody other than the injured party or could have been avoided had this other party taken reasonable steps, an individual can be eligible for compensation to cover things like medical treatment or loss of earnings.
Personal injury law may have something of a bad public image in some places, but the reality of it is that most claims are made by people who really have been victims of circumstances that could have been avoided, and who have incurred loss or substantial physical pain as a result of someone else’s actions. For these people, compensation claims can be very important in supporting them financially where an accident may have affected their ability to work, and so the view of claimants as opportunistic is not a fair one.
As you can see, these are all very different aspects of UK law where there is a good demand for legal talent, but all of them primarily serve and help members of the public.
