Thursday 26 March 2026, 18:00 (BST); BG110

The event is free to attend, but registration is required.  Please e-mail Professor Dinusha Mendis at dmendis@bournemouth.ac.uk to book your place.

Advocacy means more than simply representing and speaking in court on behalf of a client. It is the art of persuasion – persuading a tribunal that they should reach a particular decision.

This lecture will look at advocacy from the point of view of someone sat in a court who has to listen to submissions from attorneys – what judges want to hear and what they don’t want to hear. In particular, it will consider advocacy from a European perspective, with reference to the Unified Patent Court (UPC) and the European Patent Office (EPO).

The presentation will look at preparation for hearings, including suggestions for structuring submissions; it will consider how generally hearings are conducted, and how to speak effectively before a tribunal.

Dr Graham Ashley is a technical judge at at the UPC and has been involved in cases in Düsseldorf, Munich, Milan and in the appeal court in Luxembourg.

He was formerly chairman of an EPO board of appeal in mechanics, chairing over 500 cases in a wide range of general technology, such as the building/construction industry, oil exploration, weapons, metal processing, furniture and sanitary equipment (somebody has to do the toilets).

His background is metallurgy and has a PhD in electrochemistry from Cambridge. In 1996 he was called to the Bar (Lincoln’s Inn), but moved straight away to the EPO in Munich to work as a patent examiner. He was a member of the committee for the European Qualifying Examination (C – Paper: Opposition), and was responsible for drafting one of the exam papers.

He is currently involved in training national judges in handling patent disputes, and advises attorneys on presenting cases at hearings before the EPO.