Need to know

• Reasonable adjustments exist to level the playing field when disability puts someone at a substantial disadvantage.

• For high street firms, reasonable adjustments can arise in most areas of litigation; in a family case, during a discrimination claim, or even a judicial review.

Welcome to TSL’s Weekly Edge, whether you’re aiming for a regional or high-street practice, or just want to get a feel for how law works in the real world beyond textbooks, you’re in the right place. 

No corporate jargon, no massive deals, just real useful information designed to give you that extra edge in your legal journey.

🧠Wilson’s Weekly Wisdom

People often assume the most successful person is the smartest in the room. In reality, success usually comes down to consistency.

The people who achieve their goals are the ones who keep showing up. They keep applying after rejection, keep learning when no one is watching, and keep improving even when progress feels slow.

Talent might open the door, but consistency is what carries you through it and into a successful career.

Don’t worry about being the smartest. Focus on being the most consistent. Small, repeated actions today become the achievements you’re proud of tomorrow.

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Each month, we’ll pick a question and do a an editorial response. No fluff. No corporate waffle. Just honest, practical answers you can actually use in applications, interviews, and real conversations in firms.

If you’re wondering it, chances are someone else is too. So be brave, be curious, and send it in.

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💡Spotlight Article

Someone finally gets their day in court.

They’ve asked for a few reasonable adjustments because of specific limitations, but the hearing carries on like it’s any other Tuesday. No tweaks, no pauses, nothing.

Once the hearing’s at full speed, they’re instantly lost, panicking because they’re trying to follow a conversation that’s apparently three steps ahead.

It leaves you wondering the thing we all think but scarcely say out loud: if you can’t follow what’s happening in your own hearing, how’s that supposed to be fair?

🔎What’s happening? 

The Equality Act 2010 (the Act) sets the baseline. Reasonable adjustments exist to level the playing field when disability puts someone at a substantial disadvantage.

In court, the Act works alongside the Civil Procedure Rules, the latter of which maintains that parties must be on equal footing and be able to participate fully in proceedings.

Adjustments can be simple: regular breaks, remote hearings, accessible documents, communication aids, different approaches to questioning. All these aren’t about giving someone an edge, a distorted procedural benefit, if you will. Instead, the measures are about removing barriers that stop that person from fully engaging with their own case.

Even then, impartiality in a hearing goes further than adjustments.

A court must give each side equitable chances to understand what’s happening, present their respective cases, and to respond to the other side.

Under these circumstances, procedural fairness imposes safeguards and does its level best to even the odds, with common law demanding above-board decision‑making; Art 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights protects the right to a fair hearing in civil and criminal matters.

It all sounds straightforward…until it isn’t!

For example, a judge raises an issue neither side has had time to address. One party’s treated differently from the other. Questions drift past clarification and start pushing one side onto the back foot.

Within several quick moves, the problem isn’t the final decision; it’s the route the court took to get there.

Hima v Secretary of State for the Home Department shows us why that distinction matters.

Hima, an Albanian national, was appealing an immigration decision after the Home Secretary alleged his marriage was one of convenience. At his initial hearing, the judge questioned him extensively, including on points the Home Secretary hadn’t raised previously.

On appeal, the court found the hearing had been substantially flawed.

Not because the judge asked a lot of questions, but because the overall courtroom processes crossed the line due to uneven treatment of the parties, issues raised without notice, and no adequate access points for the appellant to respond. Fundamentally, the courtroom process itself had become part of the legal problem!

It’s at this point that future lawyers should pause and make a mental note because the real meaning sits behind the obvious narrative.

Procedural fairness isn’t confined to making hearings comfortable or shielding people from difficult questions. In addition, it reinforces the administration of justice by giving bona fide opportunities to be heard and fully answer any case being put to them.

Only when you see how those chances shape the direction of a hearing do the stakes become unmistakably clear, and when those moments disappear, the consequences don’t stop at a courtroom’s threshold!

❓ Why it matters to high street firms

For high street firms, reasonable adjustments can surface in almost any area of litigation, be it in a family case, during a discrimination claim, or even a judicial review. Regardless, the solicitor’s the person who would first detect any judicial constraints.

Clients may not know what they are entitled to request.

They might simply say, “I cannot concentrate for that long,” or “I do not understand questions when they are put like that.” A good solicitor needs to translate that into something easily understood and legally sound.

Reasonable‑adjustment requests should not be treated as an administrative afterthought, as they can shape how a client gives evidence, instructs their solicitor, understands a hearing and ultimately presents their case.

If the court refuses an appropriate adjustment, the solicitor needs to think strategically:

• Was the disadvantage properly explained?

• Was the request considered?

• Did the failure affect procedural quality?

• Could the issue be resolved before the hearing continues?

That last question matters even more so because litigation’s expensive enough without allowing a procedural problem to snowball into an appeal that could have been avoided with one sensible adjustment at the beginning.

So this is not only about equality compliance; it’s also about access to justice.

Procedural Fairness

It’s not enough for a court to reach the “right” outcome if one side was never given a meaningful opportunity to understand the proceedings, present their case or respond properly. 

Sometimes the problem’s not what the court decided; it’s how it got there, and procedural fairness is the force behind it all.