Park & Ride?

This Monday, the Leicestershire County Council and Leicester City Council opened the third park and ride scheme, aimed at those coming in from the north of the county. Take up has been slow; it is the first week of the county's school holidays, if you didn't already know. However, going by the comments on this article in the Leicester Mercury, it would appear that the scheme is doomed to failure. Some even revel in the prospect.

Public transport in Leicester and the county is notoriously poor. Services are split between different operators, with no integration between any of the companies involved. Travelling from one part of the county to another can mean buying multiple tickets. There is a Flexi Ticket, that allows travel across most operators, but this is not widely advertised, and when I once asked an Arriva bus driver about it, he denied all knowledge. The cost is higher than a day ticket with just one operator, and is limited to the city and suburbs.

On top of that, services often run to a timetable of their own making; I have often waited ridiculously lengthy times for a bus in the past, with the longest wait being close to an hour for a service that should have been running every 8 minutes.

Unreliability can be blamed on other motorists. It is true that in Leicestershire, we have some of the worst road systems in the UK. The BBC East Midlands news programme reported last year that the A426 into the city was the most congested road in the region. Calls to use public transport fall on deaf ears, as motorists know that bus services are unreliable, yet don't see that they are part of this problem.

Getting motorists out of their cars and onto public transport is also thwarted by the cost. The main operators in the city appear to be more concerned with increasing profit margins, as I blogged back in February. 

But even so, where the cost of running a car and the cost of parking outweighs the cost of a bus ride, some people will not give up their cars. They see the car as giving them more freedom, even if it's to sit in a traffic jam.

The Park & Ride scheme, to me, is the best of both worlds. The buses are clean, and unless there are major problems on the roads, they are very reliable, having been planned to use routes that have bus lanes. You also get the comfort of your car at the very start and end of your journey, so if you are ladened with shopping, or it's raining, you don't have to suffer.

I do think that the Leicester schemes are somewhat short-sighted.

Firstly, the services only operate until 7pm. Given that Leicester wants to compete with Nottingham, and the improvements to the city centre to give it a more cosmopolitan vibe with the bars and restaurants, it seems bizarre that there is no evening or night service. In Nottingham, there are Park & Ride schemes that operate until 1am.

For extra revenue, why not use the Park & Ride sites as taxi hubs at night? For a £2 flat fare from the city centre, anyone who has been out in town could get the bus to Enderby, or Birstall, and then pay for a taxi to the outlying towns and villages, reducing the cost of getting home. Wouldn't something like this encourage more people into the city?

The second shortfall is the limited stops. Say I wanted to go to Braunstone Gate, and not the city centre. I would have to get off the bus at St Nicholas Place, which has driven past the bus stop opposite Duns Lane, a shorter walk in stupid heels.

The original Enderby service did a loop around the city centre that has been cut. This served the Infirmary, and had been recommended for the football and rugby. Now that this loop has gone, that's fewer people potentially using the service.

As for the football and rugby, it surely can't be difficult to re-route the service to drop off and stop on Aylestone Road, thus easing congestion on an already busy road?

Oh, and provide an evening service when required.

I really do hope that the numbers at the Birstall site do pick up. Just to annoy some of the blinkered car users who refuse to accept that they are a big part of the problem with traffic in this city.

As if pupillage applications weren't hard enough...

The Bar Council yesterday made candidates who used the online Pupillage Portal aware that there have been problems again with the system. This time, it would appear that a software glitch meant that part of the application form was not printed out for assessment; in this case, the questionnaire section.

For those not familiar with the process, around 250 sets of chambers use the Portal to recruit pupil barristers. It's an online application system separated into sections. Some of the information required is saved for use with all application, however the questionnaire section contains questions that are specific to the chambers that the candidate is applying to.

Candidates can select up to 12 sets to apply to. This in itself doesn't help prospective pupils, who are limiting their chances of securing pupillage by restricting the number of applications that can be made. As the system operates once a year, and to a strict timetable, it is important to get an application right.

Because of this, the aspiring barrister will spend a lot of time and effort researching and selecting which chambers to apply to.

Further, many hours can be spent drafting, redrafting, and redrafting again, their answers to each of the questions posed. it's a long and laborious process, and one that I personally started well in advance of the opening date.

So to find out that my application may not have been complete, when assessed by the chambers that I applied to was, well, bloody annoying.

The whole process of trying to find a pupillage is soul-destroying enough as it is. Having gone through the waiting process, and the disappointment of rejection, to now have this bombshell dropped upon me has sent my fragile ego into turmoil.

Has my lack of success been down to the fact that half my application was missing? After all, I had been encouraged to apply to a number of sets, and advised as to how to deal with the questionnaire section.

Or, most likely, will I find out that there was nothing wrong with the way my form was printed, and I am just setting myself up for further "rejection" and disappointment?

Of course, what does this mean for applicants who have been affected? The Bar Council article mentions delaying pupillage offers. This suggests that it's to allow chambers to reassess and possibly interview those affected. 

Will chambers do this? I am sure some will, but what's to stop a pupillage committee from saying "sorry, you didn't meet our rigorous criteria" because they've already settled on their new pupil(s), or they can't get the same panel together to make a fair assessment?

Reading some of the forums, and tweets, there are those who think that doing this is equally unfair, after all, if chambers have already decided on their pupil(s), how can there be a fair assessment of an affected candidate? Or even of the candidates already interviewed?

This episode is another in a long line of errors that leads me to believe that the whole process needs to be looked at. Is it right and fair that aspiring barristers should be limited in such a way? After all, the odds on getting pupillage are bad enough as it is.

Also, I would ask is a system such as the Portal the right way to go about selecting prospective barristers. I can see that the form is very good for sifting based on academic achievement, but how much weight is given to the questionnaire itself? Is this only considered after the initial sifting? If so, then there is no point in applying through the Portal if, for example, you needed to explain a career break, a lack of mooting experience, or a poor result.

Whilst I understand that the Bar is unforgiving and tough, the Portal system doesn't seem to be forgiving for those who haven't managed not to cock up along the way. Chambers who recruit from CVs and covering letters seem to be more understanding than those using the Portal, contrary to what I had been told....

Whilst it is right that we have been informed of this error, a huge part of me wishes that the Bar Council had kept it quiet. I, for one, don't want to suffer the disappointment all over again.