ABSTRACT
In 2006, a lawyer named Shabnam Mughal represented a client at the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal in England. Ms Mughal is a Muslim and wore a niqab or full-face veil in public places. During her submissions, she was told by Judge George Glossop to remove her niqab because he could not hear her. Perhaps a more appropriate response to the legitimate concern of not being able to hear an advocate as she made her submissions would have been, ‘please speak up’. However, because such a request was not made, and because the lawyer refused to remove her veil,2 the case was adjourned and Mughal was replaced by a male lawyer from her firm.3
