The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has introduced a new route to qualifying as a solicitor: the Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE).
Read our SQE guidance explaining what you can expect from this route to qualification:
- overview: SQE requirements and cost
- SQE assessments: what they cover and how they're run
- SQE preparation courses
- funding the SQE
- qualifying work experience (QWE)
- qualifying work experience (QWE) for paralegals
- qualifying from abroad to work in the UK
- re-qualifying in England and Wales, a guide for international lawyers
- transitional arrangements: what you need to know if you've started on other routes
- Welsh language SQE
- useful SQE resources
- apprenticeships: an alternative route to qualification
Background
The Legal Services Board (LSB) approved the introduction of the SQE on 28 October 2020. See the SRA's announcement and our briefing on the LSB's decision and its assessment of the issues and risks.
The SQE has been introduced as part of the SRA’s Training for Tomorrow programme. The programme is in response to the report on the legal education and training review in 2013.
The report called for regulators to focus on the standards required of solicitors at the point of qualification and on an ongoing basis.
The SRA published a suite of resources ahead of the SQE's introduction.
To the level set by the SRA’s threshold standard, the SQE is designed to test:
- the competences in the statement of solicitor competence
- the knowledge in the statement of legal knowledge