Ben Murphy (TC 2008) and the University of Melbourne mooting team will represent Australia in the international rounds of the world’s largest mooting competition in the world, the Philip C Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition in Washington at the end of March.
After competing in Canberra against 17 other law schools from Australia in the national rounds, the team finished second in the final to the University of Queensland and also won the best-written submission in Australia.
‘It has been an incredible journey to date – the final took place in the High Court of Australia in front of a high court judge, which was a quite intimidating, but such an amazing experience,’ Ben said.
‘All the cases are based on real world events so you learn so much about international law and in such great depth, plus it is interesting to hear the differing opinions of other teams and how they form their arguments.
‘For me, it’s also great practice for advocacy. I would eventually like to go to the Bar so receiving feedback from barristers, solicitors and academics – and being constantly interrupted by judges, which is a very specific skills set – is invaluable to learning how courts work in the real world.
‘It’s very exciting to have the opportunity to go to Washington and we continue to practice daily with our student coach, Tim Lau (TC 2007), and Associate Professor, Tania Voon (TC 1992), and Professor Andrew Mitchell, our academic coaches.’
