Timothy Young QC is a member of 20 Essex Street, one of the country’s foremost sets for shipping and commodities work. Called to the Bar in 1977, Tim had studied law at Magdalen College, University of Oxford. He remembers: “I was working for my university finals and I forgot to apply for the Bar finals course. They asked if I’d like to stay on to do a postgraduate degree, so I did.”

Tim was then taken on as a law tutor for a few years at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, and planned to practise in Birmingham. He notes: “I had assiduously avoided anything to do with shipping. However, one night at dinner, I met the chap who was then the junior tenant in my chambers and he said, ‘Birmingham? Why do you want to go to Birmingham?! Why don’t you come and do a pupillage in my chambers?’ So I went along: I liked them and they quite liked me.”

Of course, the career path is vastly different now. Tim doesn’t even know where to begin in comparing his experiences as a pupil to those of budding barristers today. He says: “I didn’t aim at shipping and it was a series of accidents. Accidents cannot happen these days. I come from another world: the dark ages.”

Tim’s just finished working on a case that he sees as the highlight of his career. Fittingly, it’s a case known as The Golden Victory, after the vessel involved. He explains: “It was a long-term charter that was due to run until 2006. It had a little clause tucked away in it which said ‘in the event of war between any of the following, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Iraq, we shall have the option to cancel this contract’. So my client, the charterer, terminated the charter in December 2001 (after 9/11) and the owners got an award saying that we’d repudiated the contract. Then there was a question of what the damages were. But by that time, America and Iraq had engaged in hostilities and so the question was whether it was legally relevant that there was this war. Back in 2001 you couldn’t say it was probable that there would be a war, although maybe you could say it was possible.”

Tim continues: “We had all sorts of evidence from professors of war and peace studies about the likelihood of war and fascinating insights into what was going on in the White House. We went all the way to the House of Lords on this point of law; whether events two years after a breach are legally relevant. It set the legal world alight. There are radically different views. I won it three-two with Lord Bingham against me. It was a bit of a victory!”

Although appearing before the country’s most senior judges doesn’t happen all the time, there’s certainly no such thing as a typical day, notes Tim. So what does he actually do? He says: “Drink eight cups of coffee. If I’m in court I’ll get in at 5:00am and go off to court and argue. If I’m just in chambers, I’m doing paperwork. I’ll stop at about 11:00am and walk around, chat to colleagues, learn about other people’s problems, canvas opinions and drink more coffee. The great thing about the Bar is that because we share only costs, not profits, we haven’t got anybody looking over our shoulder saying we should be working. If we don’t want to work, we can go and have half an hour talking about someone else’s case. We’re not answerable to our colleagues for our time.”

It’s this freedom that Tim clearly enjoys most about his career. Another highlight is the vast variety of work he sees. “In any one day,” he explains, “I can deal with four or five cases. It keeps you young. I really wouldn’t want to do another job.”

And indeed, there’s something special about admiralty work: “The thing about shipping is that actually you do find yourself getting involved in all sorts of things that may or may not have anything to do with water. At the moment I’m looking at a dispute involving a shipbuilding contract and the bribery of members of the government of a certain country. We look at why bits of metal break – from metallurgy through chemistry through physics. We do a lot of science. People ask me: ‘I’m going to do law, shall I do Latin at A level?’ I say: ‘Don’t do Latin, do science!’”

As well as a broad academic interest, Tim suggests getting a good degree and building a broad CV. He says: “What we’re not interested in is people who just work. We want people who’ve got a bit of fun about them. You do have to have a sense of humour and a bit of breadth. I would say broaden your CV, whether it’s music, art or sport – anything other than pure work.” Tim adds: “Learn the law of contract and tort well. What we do is contract law. We have bits and bobs of other things but when you look at the major contract cases, 60% of them come from our area. Commodities and shipping have been the powerhouse of commercial law.”

But there’s something much more subtle that’s necessary for a successful career in shipping. Tim calls it precision and clarity of thought – something which is essential to every aspect of Tim’s work: “Whether it’s to do with construing a contract or working out a piece of chemistry, it’s just a question of having the willingness and the modesty to know when you don’t understand something and to ask for help.”

Foresight doesn’t go amiss either. Here’s something Tim wishes he’d had back when he was considering a career at the Bar: “I wish I’d known quite how good it was so I wouldn’t have spent two years thinking about becoming a solicitor! I just love it!”