is aware that knowing influential people would have been a career benefit?      ………..

A.    The barrister

At the age of nine, without a word of English, Hashi was sent from Kenya to live in Britain, where he was raised exclusively on state benefits, with very little to live on. “I attended badly performing schools and was always moving around between different relatives.” Despite this, Hashi managed to scrape through his exams and get into university to study law. Much later, having done a master’s degree, he was inspired to become a barrister so that he could represent people in court. “But first you have to do a work replacement where you shadow a barrister. Unfortunately, it took me 18 months before I was accepted because I didn’t have any contacts in the profession. It isn't fair, but there is no point trying to pick a fight with a system.” Now a junior barrister at a top firm, Hash! attributes this outstanding achievement against the odds to a combination of the people who believed in him, the scholarships and loans which enabled him to afford the course, strong self-discipline and a lot of hard work.