Hi guys. I'm an Australian barrister of 9 years standing. I have an upper 2:1 LLB from the University of New South Wales (considered by many to be one of Australia's best law schools) and an upper 2:1 BA(Hons) from the same university). I have also had a book published by LexisNexis Butterworths on insolvency law (which has been very well received by the profession). I am confident I could obtain a number of references from fellow barristers and also judges. I have been reading the Cambridge and Oxford websites for their BCL and LLM degree respectively and they seem to stress academic performance quite heavily. Do you think my post grad experience and writing would be taken into account? Or would i just be wasting my time without a first?

Hi.

Id say that you have a good chance of being accepted to Cambridge and Oxford. Although you dont have the first class requirement, you seem to have compensated for it by publishing a book and having a lot of experience. The references will be key to your application!

But you never know whats on the admission guys heads from where Im standing, you fit the bill! Its not 100% sure, but you had better apply anyway!

Aussie - I have a good news, I think you are with a chance...I would say try Cambridge first, they are more into potential indentifying than Oxford....I do not have a standard background and Cambridge was very willing to look at it and judge against other achievements and I admire it more for this, Oxford is looking for more "standard" backgrounds...

Throw in an application - you got nothing to lose.