Influences part 1

Last week I said I would talk about people who had influenced me. I would like to start with a schoolmaster.

John Shoard

At school (Manchester Grammar School) I had a history teacher called John Shoard. He was also the master in charge of the debating society. He organised a team to enter the ESU National Schools Public Speaking Competition.

A lunchtime quest

At the time I was not very involved in debating. I would go along to debate sometimes and make contributions from the floor. John Shoard already had two people in the proposed three-man team. Those were both boys who I did not know particularly well at that stage, although both have since remained friends who I still see regularly. One was Michael Patchett Joyce (now a barrister and possibly the country's leading expert on VAT carousel fraud). The other, the then chairman of the debating society, was Michael Crick (now author, journalist and editor of Newsnight). Having heard me contribute from the floor, Michael Crick suggested to John Shoard that I would be the right person to have as the third member of the team. John Shoard therefore set out one lunchtime to find me.

Caught red handed

He did find me. In the process of sweeping up money from a winning hand in a card game (completely against school rules - by which I mean playing cards for money, not just winning). He had a choice. I could have got into trouble, but the same time his innate sense of fairness obviously meant that he thought it would be a bit unfortunate if we all got punished just because he was trying to find me to put me in the debating team. Therefore not only was I not punished, (nor were my by now slightly poorer card playing companions) but I was still asked to join in the debating team.

National Champions

We won the national competition (the school had previously never even so much as won the Manchester area, but we won Manchester, North West and then National titles). There were some very impressive people in the other teams in the national final. One team had one of the Bonham Carters , together with the daughter of Lesley Crowther the comedian and Crackerjack presenter, another had Alan Duncan (now the MP), another Sandy Toksvig, now author and noted comic performer. After we won the competition I went on to do a lot of debating and became chairman of the school debating society. I continued the debating at University and was President of the Cambridge Union Society at the same time that Michael Crick was President of the Oxford Union Society. I wonder how much of that would have happened if either Michael Crick had not suggested me to John Shoard, or John Shoard had not been decent enough to overlook the card game and still ask me to take part anyway. Either way the speaking was an excellent grounding for court work.

Foundations

However it didn't just involve that, because he was also an enormously enthusiastic history teacher. Along with Jeremy Ward as a fellow history teacher, and Peter Farquhar, John Weeks, Brian Bass and Chris Johnson all teaching English literature, he helped me learn to think logically, research, use my imagination to think of different points of view, and present an argument logically, forcefully and expressively. They all helped lay the foundations that were developed later in my legal training.

More severe?

John Shoard is still teaching and now in his last term before retirement. I spoke to him when my son, a pupil at the school, went on a recent history trip with him. After I had brought him up-to-date on recent news regarding Mike Crick and Mike Patchett Joyce and what they were up to, in response to his question about what I was doing that weekend I told him working because I had deadlines to meet on Monday. "You never seemed to worry much about meeting the deadlines that I set you when you were at school" was his riposte. "The consequences of failing to meet a court deadline are a lot more severe." I told him. "So I should have been more severe on you?" was all he had to say.

Never too early to learn

Of course it is not a question of that. If you miss the court deadline your client’s claim can be struck out. If you are appearing in court you have to have done the preparation before you appear, whatever you have to cancel as a result. There is simply no alternative. However, albeit long since refined, honed and developed, I am still using the skills that I was first taught in the sixth form at school. Aspiring lawyers should remember it is never too soon to learn how to think logically and express yourself clearly and forcefully.

Michael J. Booth QC