Budding lawyer wins human rights contest

A UK-based law student has beaten off the challenge of fellow scholars worldwide to win a global human rights competition.

Ian McDonald, of the University of London's Birkbeck College, was named the winner of the Law Society's prestigious contest at this year's Graham Turnbull address.

The 2015 question fittingly surrounded the Magna Carta charter, in the 800th anniversary year of its formation.

The competition challenged students with under three years of qualification at the time of its closure to discuss the present-day Human Rights Act.

>Dominic Grieve, the one-time attorney general, selected Mr McDonald from half a dozen essayists short-listed by a Human Rights Committee panel.

Mr McDonald, now in his fourth year as an LLB student, kept to a human rights theme in his acceptance speech of the £500 first prize.

He said that people should be prepared to help the legal profession win the battle to preserve the Act, if or when that moment arrives.

The 2015 Turnbull Lecture was staged by the London-based Law Society.

Copyright Press Association 2015