Jamie Holmes
Jamie was awrded the 4 New Square Scholarship 2012-13
Name: Jamie Holmes
College: Balliol
Scholarship: 4 New Square Scholarship, 
I am a Commercial Chancery barrister at Wilberforce Chambers in London with a practice focussed around trusts, insolvency, civil fraud, and commercial litigation and arbitration work. I am now in my fourth year in practice, and have in that time also been significantly involved in property and pensions regulatory work.
I studied the BCL Masters programme at Balliol in the 2012-12 academic year, in which I was the very grateful recipient of a 4 New Square Scholarship, awarded by the Oxford Law Faculty.
What impact did your scholarship have on you as a student and in your career?
The scholarship was invaluable in both:
- giving me the confidence to accept a place on a post-graduate course and return to education, rather than seeking to go straight into legal practice following the completion of my LLB and a year out working in a ski resort in France; and
- giving me the freedom to dedicate myself completely to the course itself whilst participating fully in the large array of further discussion groups, lecture series and one-off guest lectures that are a key part of Oxford and the BCL’s strength in law (see below)
What aspects of your law degree have proved to be the most useful in your career so far?
The opportunity to revisit the core modules studied on my undergraduate LLB course both in the round, in more detail, and from new angles (by comparison to other legal systems, and other disciplines including in particular philosophy and economics) has given me a depth of understanding of English law that cannot be obtained from any undergraduate course. Oxford and the BCL are head and shoulders above the pack in this regard. An academic theme park.
This is the bread and butter of my day to day practice as a barrister, whether in advising clients or on my feet in court. The experience I have described above has also in particular been invaluable in helping me to advise in those more difficult cases where either there appears to be no law as yet, or the law is unclear or appears on first blush to be against your client.
A number of the particular modules that I read also have direct application to my core practice areas: in particular the Advanced Property and Trusts course.
What do you enjoy most about studying law in Oxford?
Three Things
First, the people on my course. I have not since had the opportunity to meet a group from such a diverse range of countries and legal traditions. The calibre was terrifying. People arrived with real experience and things to say in the seminars. Everyone was very enthusiastic about the course and excited to be a part of it. It was a real community, with a real buzz in the air, and still is: I remain good friends with around 10 of my cohort, I am in Chambers with 2 of them, and in contact with at least 20, which is in part a reflection of how successful my cohort has been at junior bar in the years since taking the BCL.
Second, the quality of the teaching and enthusiasm of the academics. We were given regular direct contact time with an almost absurd who’s who of names in the legal academic world. None of them disappointed, and they all were not only enthusiastic about the material but about discussing it with us and inviting us into their world.
Third, the optional extras. Even leaving aside the sport, the arts, and the speakers from the international community, the optional extras just inside the Law Faculty could have made up almost an entire programme in themselves. The numerous subject discussion groups in particular offered another opportunity to hear the academics in a slightly more informal setting hosting one of their direct peers, usually from another institution, and to then join in a debate with them all afterwards in which your views were welcome and encouraged. Everyone seemed to want to come to Oxford to speak and be a part of the BCL. In addition to the regular discussion groups there was also the option to attend any other classes you wished outside of your own four chosen modules, and a wide array of one-off lectures across the year. This greatly widened and reinforced the core strength of the programme as I have described above.
Who was the biggest influence on you when you studied here?
My peers. The biggest academic influence was the unsurpassable John Gardner.
What advice would you give to a new or prospective student?
Get stuck in: go to everything and anything in your first two terms, then reel it in and calm down in your final term to focus your thoughts for the exams.