… and other less busy ones in Scotland.
Author: Kuba Hiterski Photo: Jane McPhelim
Your face is your badge – I heard from a security guard one day clearly showing I am no stranger to the courts… – don’t worry, I am not one of those ‘pesky’ foreign criminals you can read about in tabloid press. Indeed, I have been assisting Scottish courts in a public service interpreter capacity with various frequency since 2011, a role that accounts for majority of my just over 3000 hours of professional interpreting experience.
Nowadays, as I am spending more time working in the private sector (mostly on business development) I am thinking a lot about the future of court interpreting in Scotland and what I have learned from this journey, especially that in the current political climate nothing seems certain for ever longer. This is true both locally in the United Kingdom with Brexit and still possible second Scottish independence referendum, as well as globally with the newly elected POTUS. Is there a global trend of shutting down borders, building walls and stigmatising immigrants?
As far I am concerned, I am a subcontractor to a local, Scottish business, namely Global Connects, who have been awarded a government contract with the Scottish Courts and Crown Office among others.
As a court interpreter, I have been providing an interpreting service to the Courts and Crown Office, mostly in criminal proceedings. The objective is to make the court proceedings understood by an accused or assisting a witness in giving evidence. The gravity of offences varies greatly – from common breach of peace through road traffic matters to various assaults, domestic violence, sexual offences, murders and organised crime. Moreover, I interpret in civil proceedings including Children Hearings, Scottish Children Reporter Agency panels, Small Claims Court and Family Court proceedings.
I should at this point mention that I have decided to break this article down into a series of mini-posts/articles as I had quickly realised it is virtually impossible for me to write even about the top 10 things I have learned at Glasgow Sheriff and other Scottish courts in just under 500 words. Thus, this piece should be seen as the first article in this series with more to come in subsequent months.
Here are some of my 10 key conclusions:
1) Pragmatism and meticulous time-management
Glasgow Sheriff Court is Scotland’s busiest, handling more than 11,500 cases in a year. Moreover, I often hear that Glasgow Sheriff Court is the busiest court in Europe. If this is indeed the case then one must admire the incredible sense of openness and friendliness of its staff from security guards, Police officers (that’s right, personally I strongly agree that the British cops are the best in the world!), through administration personnel all the way to Sheriffs – as judges are called in Scotland. There naturally are a few exemptions to that but they do not deserve our attention.
With anything up to 2,000 court users crossing Glasgow Sheriff Court’s threshold on a daily basis, pragmatism closely followed by time-management are probably the most valued and championed virtues of work ethos in here. Through them trust is built. I recall that once I witnessed a Procurator Fiscal helping an accused in that he found a precedent for him after his defence solicitor had resigned shortly before the trial. These two apply to interpreters as well, not only when we are trusted in that what we interpret is true and accurate, but also when it comes to other critical matters like multitasking (often an interpreter is required to deal with more than one case in a day). Given the unpredictability of how long court interpreting may last and court proceedings in general, I had to adopt and ALWAYS carry my portable laptop, smartphone, chargers and powerbanks (oh and snacks too!) with me so that I can keep an eye on and answer emails, take and make calls, prepare quotes and basically keep in touch with the world – and I do mean, the world as I often need to speak, chat, skype, whatsapp or otherwise connect with people around the globe. So it is not unusual to sit outside the courtroom, checking on an email from a client in Australia or United States, sending a message to a supplier in Germany or China whilst being fully prepared to start interpreting in a trial or a custody matter which can call at any time – easy peasy lemon squeezy!
To be continued…