IT’S GLAMOROUS, sexy, adrenalin-filled and different from almost every other sector of the law. Long hours may be required, but if many are spent gearing up for court cases and being on one side or the other of an injunction, perhaps an equal number will be in swish West End restaurants for those important networking dinners. Still more time may be spent in the company of celebrities or, increasingly, Premier League footballers. There might even be the odd trip to South America or a Caribbean island to sift evidence before a libel trial.

Add to all that a feeling of being in the Zeitgeist of any number of intellectual issues — privacy, the limits of confidence, the right to freedom of expression — and it is easy to see why so many people want to get into media law.

How can an aspiring media lawyer break into one of the most oversubscribed niches? And what kind of person makes the grade and secures one of those elusive training contracts? Nigel Tait, a media law expert at Peter Carter-Ruck and Partners, knows a thing or two about what it takes. He was made a partner by Peter Carter-Ruck, the recently deceased grand old man of libel, just four months after he had qualified as a solicitor, and has since acted in many big libel actions.

Tait says that good communication skills come with the territory, to the extent that those whose academic prowess may not be the best can still make their way. “Natural instincts are vital in media law,” he says. “Pure legal knowledge is not hugely important, especially in libel cases where an understanding of the personalities involved — the jury, the client, the barristers — is often of more value.” Tait also says that most of his firm’s trainees in recent years have formerly been on summer work placements at the firm — a good way of getting experience and, if you are lucky, a job.

One solicitor who benefited from a work placement is Salayha Hussain, who was given the opportunity to spend two weeks in October 2000 at Northern & Shell Plc, publisher of the Express titles and OK! magazine. Hussain’s spell was so successful that it led to an in-house training contract, and she is now one of the company’s group legal advisers, with a CV that includes a trip to Pakistan to broker the release of the Express reporter Yvonne Ridley from Afghanistan.

“You have got to be a people person, and able to think quickly,” says Hussain, whose daily fare includes negotiating commercial contracts with celebrities for OK! and managing litigation. “There’s a constant interaction with journalists and the job doesn’t involve playing a conventional solicitor’s role. And you have to enjoy the media and know what’s going on.”

David Hooper, a partner at Reynolds Porter Chamberlain and one of the country’s leading media lawyers, agrees that having your finger on the pulse is essential. “You must like the people involved in the media and be interested in their problems,” says Hooper, who acted for Peter Wright and his publishers in the Spycatcher litigation and for Vanity Fair in a libel action brought by Mohamed Al Fayed. Hooper also cautions that it is not all glamour.

“To succeed, you have to accept that you’re not working in a normal nine-to-five world. An understanding of the interaction between publishing, broadcasting and newspapers is fundamental, so too an understanding of the laws of copyright.”

An understanding of copyright, and a CV with intellectual property work for media organisations, can be a way into the racier world of media litigation, says Gill Phillips, head of litigation at Times Newspapers. “People have to be realistic and recognise that there are very few firms offering pure media training contracts,” Phillips says. “But that said, people often take jobs in rights departments and work sideways into litigation.”

But once there, what do they find? “It’s got to be one of the most creative and individualistic of all legal jobs,” she says. “It can be stressful but it’s also fun and entertaining. And how many jobs are there that mean you have to read the newspapers every day?” Not many. But those who wish to join Phillips et al know what they have to do. For a start, read the papers . . .

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