President’s Jottings

WINTER 2021

President’s Jottings

The nightmare that was the year 2020 is over. But was it the worst year ever?

When I became President of SLS at the AGM in November 2019, we had plans in place for a great 2020, building on our successes of recent years and strengthening relationships. Things got off to an excellent start after having had good and positive conversations with our patrons and supporters about the year ahead. In February 2020, we had a well attended Conveyancing and Private Client Conference at the Mandolay in Guildford and we were set to have record numbers at a sold out Legal Brain of Surrey Quiz at the Weyside pub in March 2020. Everything seemed good with the world, but then it all changed. Just days before the quiz, the World Health Organisation declared the global Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic on 11 March 2020 and unprecedented restrictions on all our lives followed, as we entered lockdown for the first time on 23 March 2020.

At the time when we all hurried home at the beginning of lockdown we had no idea when it would end, but it put an end to the plans that we had. I’m fairly confident that whatever you had planned for 2020, it probably didn’t happen either. Instead, we had to rewrite the training and events programme and quickly move over to a virtual world. Looking back, 2020 was full of completely novel and crazy experiences: toilet paper panic buying, social distancing, lockdowns, quarantines, washing and sanitising your groceries, elbow bump greetings, takeaway beer and wine and a lot of online meetings.

2020 was hailed by many as “the worst year ever”, but was it? There are several strong contenders for that title. The final year of the First World War in 1918 was pretty bad when the Spanish flu wiped out millions around the world, and some historians say that the truly worst year ever was 536. That’s the year a volcano erupted in Iceland and the sun dimmed for a year and a half, leading to a catastrophic global cold spell. That year snow fell in summer, crops failed, people starved and a few years later a massive plague erupted that would lead to the collapse of the Roman Empire. 2020 was a bad year, but not quite that bad in my opinion.

For many of us though, 2020 was the worst year of our lifetimes because COVID-19 was everywhere and personally affected almost everyone. Many of us had to adapt, and quickly. Home working, home schooling, the blurring of work and personal life and other things, or, rather, in the case of lockdown, lack of things, were experienced that we never imagined we would have to face and this became the new normal. It was, without question, a very challenging time.

We also lost John Perry. A stalwart supporter of SLS and a giant of a man, known and respected for decades, who passed years before his time. Saying goodbye to John on behalf of SLS was probably the hardest thing I had to do as President, and less than a year after my first act as President of honouring him for his outstanding work and service to our Society, when he was made an Honorary Member in 2019. It was a shock and John left a legacy that will not be matched by many and will be sorely missed by all who knew him.

While 2020 was a very challenging year, we overcame the challenges with grit and determination and by supporting and encouraging one another. While the original SLS training and events programme for 2020 had to be largely scrapped, the rewritten programme worked out very well in the end and there were some huge positives to take from it. The virtual world that we were forced to operate in made meetings with local law societies and others up and down the country much more feasible and, therefore, more frequent. Online forums proved very popular with members and we were able to collaborate and work much more closely with Surrey Junior Lawyers Division to provide a new support initiative. We have reflected on the positives to come out of the crisis and the SLS training and events programme for 2021 is very much a mix of the old and the new world – it is something that we are very excited about.

I attended many virtual meetings with the Law Society and other local law societies during 2020, including the virtual Presidents’ and Secretaries’ Conference. Nothing groundbreaking that we weren’t already doing came out of it and, in many ways, SLS was and is ahead of the curve.

2020 was one of the three worst years ever, but it has been a huge privilege to serve as President. We have a resilient legal community here in Surrey and you should all be proud of what you have achieved in very difficult circumstances. Here’s hoping for a better 2021 and beyond. ■

With my very best wishes,

Nick Ball

President