One Tory newbie politico-barrister standing in Hampshire, and our old friend — the former telly producer turned Justice Secretary — come in for some stick

The general election remains far to close to call in terms of a result, and probably will until polling day — but lawyers can satisfy political entertainment needs in the meantime by observing the tribulations of their colleagues on the campaign trail.

First in the spotlight is administrative and planning law specialist barrister Suella Fernandes.

The 10-year-call tenant at the London branch of Birmingham’s No5 Chambers is aiming to nail down the safe Conservative seat of Fareham in Hampshire, where she’s defending a majority of about 17,000 picked up last time round by Mark Hoban.

But not all the locals appear to be that keen on Fernandes or her profession, as this picture published last week in the Portsmouth News suggests.

Image via Portsmouth News

Local council leader Sean Woodward, leapt to the barrister’s defence, telling the newspaper:

“It’s criminal damage and it is not in line with democracy. People have the right to display election posters on their land and this is criminal damage and apart from that it is wrong in every way.”

Meanwhile, legal aid lawyers must nursing a bad case of cramp, having kept their fingers crossed for so long in the hope that the last government’s Justice Secretary and Lord Chancellor will not be returning to his ministerial seat — even if the Tories do crawl over the Downing Street finishing line.

The Justice Alliance — which has organised countless events and demonstrations in protest at Chris Grayling’s legal aid reforms — is holding a farewell party for the reviled Justice Secretary some 48 hours before the nation schleps to the polls.

There is little chance that Grayling will lose his seat — the former television producer is defending a majority over the Liberal Democrats of more than 16,100 in the Surrey stockbroker belt seat of Epsom and Ewell.

But if the Tories manage to scrape together a government in the next few weeks, he could be in line for another ministry … or even the backbenches.

The post Election latest: some voters aren’t that sold on lawyer candidates appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Further proof that Mail readers really, really hate lawyers

Ed Miliband’s barrister wife, Justine Thornton, was yesterday skewered by the Daily Mail for breaking “countless cycling laws” on her commute to and from 39 Essex Chambers in the Temple.

As ever, it was the reader comments on the Mail Online version of the story that proved most entertaining — and revealing about middle England’s attitude to lawyers.

Not to be trusted

Wants to ruin Britain

Corrupt

Hypocrites

Conspiring to line their pockets through strategic marriages

Anti-meritocratic

Bereft of ability

Lawyers don’t give a toss about law

Slipping standards

Justine Miliband veers to the right… and breaks countless cycling laws in the process! Ed’s barrister wife risks thousands in fines after multiple road offences [Mail Online]

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Exclusive: The very expensive fortnight may leave students in more debt and still jobless

A niche London practice is pitching a £2,000 homemade diploma at law students who haven’t secured training contracts, but who are keen on the bright lights of media law.

New Media Law — which is based on the fringes of London’s Soho — is gearing up for the second year of its media and business affairs “diploma”, with 25 takers apparently already on board for the fortnight course this June.

According to the firm’s website, the course is aimed at law degree and Legal Practice Course (LPC) graduates keen on securing training contracts in media law firms. In a statement to Legal Cheek, the firm said its offering was also aimed at authors, musicians, actors, film directors and producers wanting to know more about the law in their various fields.

At a time of falling training contract numbers — statistics released this week by the Law Society show that training contracts have nosedived by nearly 12.5% over the last decade — the firm would appear to have something of a marketing success on its hands, having claimed to have more than doubled the number of takers from 11 on last year’s launch course.

Nonetheless, the course — which is promoted on New Media Law’s website (pictured below) — will raise concern in some quarters as it arguably encourages LPC students without training contracts to dive into an even deeper hole of debt. And more traditional course providers might not react well to a law firm jumping onto their patch and competing for market share.

New Media Law told Legal Cheek that “in most cases” it offers a one-week unpaid internship to all those on the course. However, the firm said it reserves the right to refuse an internship if the partners take the view that a student would not benefit, would not be suited to the firm, or the firm did not have enough intern places available.

In addition to the diploma, New Media Law says that it has an unpaid intern programme running year round, with some progressing to employed paralegal roles.

According to one the firm’s founding partners and a main driver behind the diploma, Ian Penman, four have gone on to be offered training contracts.

The course — which is also open to practising lawyers — is not accredited by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) because, said Penman, the SRA is phasing out its historic continuing professional development requirements.

“We did not feel it appropriate to gain SRA accreditation,” he said. “The diploma is the certificate that we award attendees who pass the course. The end of course examination is not extremely demanding, but it would be impossible to pass it if one has not attended the course and listened to pretty much every word. The higher grades offered … are not easy at all.”

Explaining the rationale behind the diploma, Penman told Legal Cheek:

“We have often discussed the lack of a good copyright/media law-based course — exclusively lectured by experienced practitioners in their fields, which deals with media/entertainment law in central London. We decided to offer one ourselves, as we concluded that there was a need for it.”

Until last week, New Media Law’s website stated that the course was conducted at the University of Westminster.

But it has since been amended to describe its location more generally as in “central London”.

A spokeswoman for the university told Legal Cheek that Westminster was not linked to the course apart from letting the law firm space to provide it.

New Media Law’s Penman has lectured on the Westminster University LPC for the last two decades, having written that course’s entertainment and media module as wall as having co-written its e-commerce module.

The post Law firm charges wannabe solicitors thousands for homemade diploma and internship appeared first on Legal Cheek.

This expletive-fuelled — but strangely nearly cogent — notice to a US federal court judge may be the rudest official legal document ever

One of the strongest arguments against the last government’s slash-and-burn of civil legal aid was that the cuts will remove lawyers from the equation and clog courts with litigants-in-person, who may have strong points, but will make a rambling mess of their cases.

Well, if this example from the US is an indication of what we have to look forward to, some might cry: bring it on — if only for the comedy value.

Meet Floridian Tamah Jada Clark. She is a woman who doesn’t take any sh*t from the bench. We use that word and construction advisedly, as it is exactly in the spirit of Clark’s 34-page submission to the US District Court for the Northern District of Georgia (Atlanta Division).

To put it simply, and in language Clark would understand, the litigant-in-person tears Judge Willis B Hunt Jr a new a*shole.

Our friends at Above the Law in the States have unearthed this written submission to the court from last week, in which Clark unleashes a fusillade of expletives at the bench far too numerous to recite in full.

But here’s a taster from the just the first page:

“Don’t you ever again in your mother*ucking [sic] life attempt to disrespect me, my family or our status again. Keep our names out of your unworthy mouth — you old IMPOTENT geezer.”

The notice itself is headed:

“To f*ck this court and everything it stands for.”

Robust advocacy, indeed — and let’s face it, what member of the English bar won’t have harboured similar sentiments regarding certain judges in the past.

The thing about Clark’s submission is that while her style is peppered with obscenities — albeit, coyly modified with asterisks — she still writes in a relatively lucid and grammatically correct manner … mostly.

Clark also throws loads of law and legal argument into the mix — whether any of it is remotely valid is open to debate and analysis by those more au fait with US jurisprudence than those in the Legal Cheek offices.

But at least Clark gets a gold star for trying — and for personality.

Read the submission in full below:

Notice to Fuck This Court and Everything That It Stands For

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Law firms can’t resist competing with each other — even over charity events, as a league table currently being updated on social media graphically illustrates

London’s streets are soon to be flooded with Clifford Chance lawyers and staff as the global firm is miles ahead in the race to dominate a leading legal profession charity event.

The Canary Wharf giant has already signed up 192 souls for next month’s London Legal Walk, more than double the second place law firm — and well ahead of its magic circle rivals.

The event’s organising team — at the London Legal Support Trust — has been posting regular updates on Twitter, detailing the number of walkers and the amount of cash that has been donated. Trailing in second in terms of law firm participants so far is blue-stocking practice Farrer & Co. As of the end of this week, that firm had 91 walkers limbering up.

But it is not known whether partner Mark Bridges — the private solicitor to Her Maj since 2002 — will be among those trudging along the route. The 10k course passes by his client’s London gaff, but he probably sees enough of that in his day job.

Rounding out the law firm top five are Allen & Overy with 87 walkers listed, DLA Piper (84) and Mishcon de Reya (78).

The only other magic circle player to feature in the current top 10 is Anglo-German giant Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, which is currently fielding 74 walkers.

Barristers’ chambers are understandably unable to compete at anything approaching those numbers. The top outfit is mid-tier Chancery and commercial set Outer Temple Chambers, which has so far rallied 23 walkers.

Close behind is criminal and family specialist set in the Temple, Goldsmith Chambers with 21. Rounding out the bar top five are 1 Chancery Lane with 16 participants so far, 4 Paper Buildings and Carmelite Chambers (each on 15).

Two legal sector publishing rivals are battling for top of the non-law firm and non-chambers league table — and so far LexisNexis is streets ahead of Thomson Reuters. LN has signed up 111 staff for the slog, while TR has so far press-ganged only 71 into donning a silly t-shirt.

Rounding out that category’s top five are the Government Legal Service (59), the in-house legal team at Barclays Bank and the Crown Prosecution Service (both 57).

Organisers maintain that the numbers of teams and individuals signed up so far has already outpaced last year’s participation.

Fundraising is on a par with 12 months ago — so far, slightly more than £90,000 has been raised for the London Legal Support Trust, a charity raising cash for free legal services in capital and the southeast.

Last year, some 8,000 walkers from more than 500 teams slogged round central London, irritating grumpy commuters in their daily bid to get trains and buses home. But it was all for a good cause as ultimately the 2014 walk raised £560,000.

The walkers will hit the pavement on the evening of 18 May. Legal Cheek is one of the sponsors and for more information, click here.

Follow @londonlegal

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When will the bubble burst? There are 190% more practising today than 30 years ago

Despite the worst economic crash for generations and the creeping use of legal process outsourcing, the UK’s biggest legal profession continued to grow like Topsy over the last decade.

Figures released earlier this week from the Law Society of England and Wales showed that the number of solicitors at law firms in the jurisdiction leapt by slightly more than 20% between 2004 and 2014.

In the boom mid-2000s — before bankers laid waste to the global economy — there were 75,709 solicitors in private practice; by last year, that figure had soared to 90,306.

And the increase over the last generation-plus has been even more dramatic, with the number of law firm solicitors rocketing by 133% since 1983, when there were just 38,674 in private practice.

The overall number of solicitors in practice — including those working in-house at corporations, central and local government — has also increased even more significantly.

That figure has risen by 35% since 2004 to 130,382 — and by 190% since 1984, when there was a mere 44,837 in practice.

Just how long that rate of increase can continue will be a subject of considerable geek debate, not least against a backdrop of falling training contract numbers at City law firms and the increased use of non-qualified paralegals for commoditised work at both commercial and high street practices.

Larger firm pull

Law Society researchers point out that in 2013 a statistical blip showed the number of practising solicitors slightly decreasing. But they blamed that drop on delays in processing practising certificate data that year — a thinly-veiled jibe at the Solicitors Regulation Authority, the body responsible for that role.

The society’s annual statistical report also illustrated the continuing consolidation of solicitors into larger law firms. The report’s authors point out that 15 years ago, 17% of private practice solicitors worked at larger law firms, defined as those of 81-plus partners. Today that figure is 28%.

But partnerships of all sizes appear to tightening their grip on law firm equity. The report shows that in 2004 nearly 37.5% of private practice solicitors were partners, today that figure has dropped below 33%.

There are currently 24% more men than women partners across the solicitors’ profession England and Wales, but the latter are gradually narrowing the gap. Ten years ago men had a 26.7% lead at partnership tables.

The post Solicitor numbers rocket by 20% in face of tough economic climate appeared first on Legal Cheek.

King of the establishment firm hits psychologically important £70k mark, but still trails well behind Yanks in City

Old-school tie magic circle firm Slaughter and May has leapt to the top of the young lawyer English pay league today — bumping up salaries for newly-qualified staff and trainees.

Freshly-minted lawyers at S&M will now be on £70,000 — a rise of more than 7.5% that means those junior solicitors will be at lest £2,500 better off than their magic circle counterparts.

Indeed, the move could trigger a Square Mile pay war as Slaughter and May becomes the best paying English firm. Its closest rivals are Canary Wharf giant Clifford Chance and Anglo-German mega-firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, both of which chuck their NQs annual whacks of £67,500.

Magic circle newly-qualified pay is rounded out by Allen & Overy on £66,500, and the poor-boys of the gang, Linklaters, where NQs struggle on £65,000.

Trainee joy

S&M trainees are also benefiting from the senior partners’ flush of munificence. First-year trainees will get a one grand rise taking them to £41,000. That whack rises to £46,000 in the second year.

The boost takes Slaughter and May to the top of the English trainee pay league as well. In relation to both newly qualified and trainee salaries, the firm now only trails the London offices of the moneybags US law firms.

But it has a long way to go before catching them up. According to the Legal Cheek Most List, Akin Gump, Davis Polk and Sullivan & Cromwell all pay their NQs a smooth £100,000. However, S&M is within striking distance of White & Case — currently in 10th position on the pay table — where NQs currently are on £72,000.

Likewise, the US firms continue to rule the trainee pay market. The Legal Cheek table has Davis Polk and Sullivan & Cromwell on top, each chucking their first-year trainees £50,000.

Hard work

Slaughter and May also threw some cash at second and third-year PQE lawyers. Pay for the former rose from £79,000 to £87,000, while for the latter it went from £89,000 to £96,500.

Explaining the Christmas-arrives-early approach at Bunhill Row, S&M executive partner Richard Clark said:

“These salary increases reflect the fact that we recognise the importance of rewarding our lawyers for their hard work and commitment to the firm.”

Take note, rest of MC.

Which firms pay the most? Check out the Legal Cheek Most List for the full rankings.

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Women law students and young female lawyers doubtless have to battle leery male counterparts — but there are gradations of perviness

Sex and sexism are always good value talking points — as Legal Cheek’s report earlier this week on the alleged experiences of a couple of female Cambridge University law undergraduates demonstrated.

At last count, there were 70 comments — some of them approaching essay-length — regarding the article on this site. The story focused on the potential perils faced by female students at law school networking events with solicitors’ firms and barristers’ chambers.

It was based on an article in Cambridge’s Varsity newspaper, which recounted tales from two women law students. They told of sleazy older male lawyers — those toddling along on Zimmer frames in their thirties — who appeared to fancy them. In one case, a 30-something barrister suggested to a law student that they share a post-networking event drink.

The two women law students cited in the Varsity article were adamant: the legal profession is rife with predatory male lawyers whose sole purpose when attending networking events is to chance their arms with what they viewed as a bazar of law school totty.

It’s all about the power game — the employment market is competitive and tight, and these unscrupulous stripy-suited beasts are prepared to exploit the desire of students to get an edge as means of getting their own legs over.

Is that true? Are male lawyers on the student milk round barely a notch above Max Clifford in their approach to vulnerable women students? Possibly — but these were woefully poor examples if that’s the case.

Or at the very least, they were poorly related. The law student invited for the post-networking event drink may well have felt intimidated, uncomfortable and threatened. But on the face of it, the offer of a quick snifter is not harassment. Oddly enough, heterosexual male lawyers with no interest whatsoever in getting each other into the sack often go out for drinks together.

But even if male lawyers that are a decade or so senior to undergraduate law students do try it on subtly — what should be done? People try it on with people — and often they succeed. That’s why the planet’s population has more than doubled in the last 50 years.

Of course, using a position of power and the carrot of career advancement to boost one’s chances of a shag is unpleasant and degrading for the other party.

Perhaps law firms and chambers should send more 30-something women to networking events. But is it beyond the realm of possibility that a successful 35-year-old female City associate — or high-flying commercial law senior-junior — might flirt with a second-year male law student?

The 1994 film Disclosure may have been every middle-aged executive’s fantasy — or at least Michael Douglas’s fantasy — but it is not unheard of for women in positions of power to be sexually predatory. Or for that matter, just interested in sex.

Human relations in the workplace — or in a professional environment — are not easy. Issues can be further complicated when the setting has a more social atmosphere. Let’s face it — booze has a lot to answer for in this discussion.

But adults just have to get on with dealing with the pitfalls of being human as best they can. Gratuitous Max Clifford-style harassment should be reported; but the offer of an unwanted post-networking drink should just be politely declined.

It is interesting to note that the original article on the Varsity newspaper website received precisely no comments. Perhaps Cambridge law students aren’t as exercised about the bumbling advances of the odd male lawyer as Legal Cheek readers might imagine.

Follow @JudgeJohnHack

Previously:

Cambridge law students claim they’re being hit on by ‘predatory’ solicitors and barristers [Legal Cheek]

The post The Judge Rules: Offering a glass of wine doesn’t amount to harassment appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Good times in Brizzle

Bristol firm Burges Salmon — which claims to offer a utopian combination of City quality work and chilled out West Country living — announced today that it is to keep on 24 out of 24 of its qualifying trainees.

The 100% retention figure is an improvement on the firm’s autumn 2014 results, which saw 91% of rookies go on to full-time positions.

And so confident is Burges Salmon of its health in the wake of these two impressive results that it has re-iterated a pledge to offer more training contracts.

Back in August, the firm told Legal Cheek that it was going to up TC numbers by 12.5% from 24 in 2013-14 to 27-29 in this recruitment round, adding that it “hopes” to raise that figure to 30 in the years ahead.

This morning the Bristolians were trotting out the same line to Lawyer2B, repeating their “hopes” to have “up to 30 trainees” starting at the firm in 2017.

Of the trainees who have just qualified at the firm, six each will go into dispute resolution and commercial, four into, respectively, real estate and corporate, while the environment and energy teams take two each, and pensions, engineering and construction one each.

The youngsters enter these practice areas following a six seat training contract, marking the firm out from most rivals, which tend to offer trainees experience in just four departments.

The downside to life in this delightful enclave off the M4?

The money reflects the moderate and sensible nature of the place: trainees start on £33,000 and NQs get £42,500. Very good money, of course, but lower than the amount awarded by most corporate firms in exchange for a year of a clever graduate’s 20s.

Which firms pay most? Check out the Legal Cheek Most list for all the answers.

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Huntin’, shootin’ and fishin’ specialist says government should legislate to force mega-law firms into pro bono deal

Magic circle law firms should launch pro bono criminal law practices to fill gaps left in legal aid after the last government’s regime of cuts, says the lawyer who recently called for dedicated Islamic airlines and airports.

Solicitor-advocate Jamie Foster — now a partner at east Devon law firm Foster & Griffin — took to social media in the run-up to Thursday’s general election, where he vented spleen over the on-going legal aid debate.

Foster — an animal welfare and country sports specialist practitioner, who joined the west country firm last September — argued on Twitter that large global practices are well-placed to pick up the criminal legal aid slack.

He also flew the controversial kite that mega-firms should be obliged to participate in the pro bono scheme if they wanted to be allowed to practise commercial law in the UK.

I would require city firms to supply criminal advice pro bono in order to practice commercial law in the UK @danbunting @AdamPorte

— Jamie Foster (@1jamiefoster) May 5, 2015

Foster’s argument essentially runs in support of the last government’s Lord Chancellor, Chris Grayling — and it is by no means the most controversial stance he has adopted on social media.

A little more than a year ago — when Foster was a partner at leading mid-tier law firm Clarke Wilmott — the lawyer unleashed a Twitter storm by suggesting a novel solution to the perceived terror threat to air travel.

Create Muslim-only airlines and airports was Foster’s view, suggesting the move would at least allow other passengers to carry as much water in the cabin as they liked. Clarke Willmott scrambled to distance itself from the lawyer’s comments — and he left the practice shortly after the Twitter furore.

Foster’s latest social media hand grenade has attracted mostly reasoned criticism, with Twitter commentators arguing that handing over large chunks of criminal defence work to corporate-commercial and transactional lawyers might not be in the best interests of justice.

Indeed, one imagines that the firm’s indemnity insurers — not to mention the profession’s regulator — would also be less than enamoured with the idea. Sending recently-qualified mergers and acquisitions solicitors into police cells and magistrates’ court in their spare time might just have the word negligence written all over it.

But to be fair on Foster, the constraints of abbreviated comment on Twitter have done him a slight disservice. The solicitor explained to Legal Cheek that his proposal is more sophisticated than simply unleashing recently-qualified City lawyers loose on the criminal justice system.

Instead, Foster would effectively hand over the responsibilities currently held by the Legal Aid Agency to a consortium of large commercial practices that would in turn sub-contract the actual work to a group of small criminal law specialist firms.

“Little firms that are still very good firms would still get the work,” said Foster.

However, he maintained that commercially astute City practices would be more efficient at running the show than is the current government quango.

Crucial to Foster’s plan would be a conditional fee agreement-style deal for the City firms and their outsourced criminal law providers. If they ran successful defences at trial, costs would be reimbursed from central funds — with an uplift.

“Nobody is currently being honest about legal aid,” Foster told Legal Cheek. “Someone needs to get a grip on it and fund the system properly and efficiently.”

Previously:

Clarke Willmott partner to leave firm after calling for ‘dedicated Islamic airports and airlines’ on Twitter [Legal Cheek]

The post Solicitor who called for all-Islamic airlines now wants City law firms to fund criminal legal aid appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Ed Miliband’s margin over the Conservatives is narrow, but enough to give the red rose party an outright majority

Ed Miliband will be striding into Downing Street on Friday — if Legal Cheek readers get their way.

Our 24-hour poll conducted yesterday and this morning — attracting nearly 750 responses — shows the Labour Party winning 35.3% of the vote in tomorrow’s UK general election, narrowly pipping the Conservatives, which came in on 33.8%.

The Liberal-Democrats will be pushed into fourth place behind the Greens, according to the survey. Some 9.8% of respondents backed Natalie Bennett’s Green Party, while only 8.7% gave the nod to Nick Clegg’s Lib-Dems.

The Lib-Dems have historically been a favourite with some students, until the party famously ditched its opposition to university tuition fees during the last coalition government.

Graph: Legal Cheek general election poll results

The survey indicated that Legal Cheek readers have little time for the purple revolution proposed by Nigel Farage and his Ukip party. Only 3.3% of respondents backed the pint-guzzling EU bashers.

An imponderable left by the survey results is the impact of the Scottish Nationalist Party. Nationwide polls across the population have consistently indicated a hung parliament being the likely result, not least because of an expected landslide for the Scots Nats north of the border. Most Legal Cheek readers are based in England and Wales, but some Scots did respond, with Nicola Sturgeon’s merry band of separatists picking up 3% support in this poll.

The majority of the 735 respondents were students; slightly more than 54% said they were studying law. The next category was qualified barristers, with marginally more than 12% of the total saying they were from that side of the legal profession. An additional 4% of respondents were pupil barristers.

The largest branch of the profession also weighed in — more than 10% of respondents were solicitors with another 10% being trainees. Other respondents included legal academics, recruiters and even the judiciary.

Graph: Legal Cheek general election poll respondents

The Legal Cheek poll results came just hours after a fellow legal affairs publication flagged the fact that the older, top end of the solicitors’ profession was definitely blue.

A Legal Week poll (£) of law firm partners resulted in 70% of respondents backing the Tories.

And yesterday, the Times Higher Education Supplement released a survey showing that law school lecturers were even keener on Labour than Legal Cheek readers. Some 40% said they would back Miliband’s party, with the Tories and Greens each on 19%, and the Lib-Dems languishing on 6%.

While hardly scientific, when the Legal Cheek poll results were fed into the BBC’s election result calculator, a top outcome popped out the other side for Labour’s bacon-butty-scoffer-in-chief.

According to Auntie’s computer, Ed Miliband’s party would waltz into No 10 with an outright majority of 54. The Legal Cheek House of Commons would look like this:

That would mean former human rights law specialist solicitor Sadiq Khan slipping onto the woolsack as Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. In turn, it would be good-bye to incumbent Chris Grayling.

With Grayling perched on a constituency majority of about 15,000 in the Surrey seat of Epsom and Ewell, it is unlikely that he will be turfed out of the commons altogether.

However, with the glory days of the Ministry of Justice behind him, Grayling might be tempted to return to his former career as a television producer — or challenge a certain B Johnson for the Tory Party leadership.

The post Legal Cheek election poll results: law students and lawyers back Labour appeared first on Legal Cheek.

It’s amazing what you can stumble across in the rush hour at one of London’s busiest railway stations

A video posted by Legal Cheek (@legalcheek) on May 11, 2015 at 12:29am PDT

In a move reminiscent of Charlton Heston’s stranded astronaut character being banged up by malevolent simians in the original “Planet of the Apes”, a lawyer has spent the morning caged at London’s Liverpool Street Station.

Legal Cheek has learnt that the lawyer in question is ex-Berwin Leighton Paisner City solicitor William Robins, who is now chief operations officer of virtual law firm Keystone.

Keystone — which was launched in 2002 and granted alternative business structure-status 11 years later — is apparently looking to kick-off a recruitment drive.

And it clearly reckons that sending the message to lawyers that their current firms lock them in metaphorical cages of obsolete and shackled working practices is the way to win their hearts.

Robins — who qualified as a corporate lawyer in 2003 — spent a portion of the morning soaking up the bemused stares of harassed commuters, most of whom were doubtless curious as to why anyone would want to spend more time at Liverpool Station than absolutely necessary. Although, apparently one lost punter did stop to ask him for directions.

Our spies tell us that the lawyer scarpered after about an hour — presumably to get on with his high-powered day job — and was replaced by an actor.

Nonetheless, Robins (pictured below) wins pluck points for stepping into such a public promotion in the first place. What was the point?

Speaking to Legal Cheek through the bars of his traditional, leather-bound lawyer office cell, he perhaps ill-advisedly — considering last week’s election result — recalled the words of Labour leader Ed Miliband.

“There is a squeezed middle of high performing partners who are not happy at their current firm, but who are trapped by billing targets, long hours and the eat-at-your-desk-culture,” he said.

“We want to reach out to those lawyers, we want to set them free, and if the only few seconds they have to think about their career is on the walk from the station to the office, then that’s where we need to be.”

Robins maintained that while Keystone — which currently has some 160 lawyers on its books — has ambitious recruitment targets, the practice is not simply looking to bulk up its headcount.

“It’s not just about numbers,” Robins said, rattling his grub pan against the iron bars. “The real focus is quality. We want to be the first choice for all entrepreneurial partners who don’t want to jump out of the frying pan of their current firm and into the fire of another traditional firm and by doing so we can ensure every Keystone lawyer is a highly respected practitioner.”

The question for Keystone — which prefers to be described as a “dispersed” rather than virtual firm — is whether it can convince lawyers that working remotely is actually more attractive than slogging into an office.

The reality is that while City firms may cage their lawyers, they do so with gilded bars, offering all the mod cons imaginable in glass tower blocks, complete with technical and administrative support on tap.

And despite the office politics and corporate grind, some might prefer that to chatting to clients from their sitting rooms kitted out in nothing but a pair of pants and dressing gown all day.

The post There was a lawyer in a cage at Liverpool Street station this morning appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Bercow v Bercow was the unexpected result from last week’s general election as Stephenson Harwood man allegedly falls for charms of speaker’s wife

The latest unlikely legal profession Romeo has been revealed as commercial litigation partner Alan Bercow of City-based shipping specialist practice Stephenson Harwood.

He allegedly features in a torrid tale of high-powered bed-hopping behind the back of his cousin, House of Commons Speaker John Bercow.

Alan was at the centre of a media storm over the weekend, when first the Daily Mail and then much of the rest of Fleet Street reported that he had engaged in pre-election hanky-panky with Sally Bercow, his cousin’s wife.

Both Sally and Alan’s own wife — also reported to be a lawyer — are said to have confirmed the affair. It is understood that Alan and Sally cuddled up on the sofa in the latter’s Battersea, south-west London gaff to watch Newsnight election coverage.

All while John — who remained in House of Commons digs — was slogging around his constituency in Buckingham, bidding to keep his seat. It may be cold comfort relative to the personal trauma in his family life, but John increased his majority by 17%, pushing the UKIP candidate to a distant second place.

Sally achieved yet more notoriety two years ago — in what has been a fairly notorious time at Westminster — when the late Lord McAlpine sued her over an “innocent face” tweet following unfounded suggestions that he had been involved in the sexual abuse of children.

Meanwhile, 57-year-old Alan is now reported to have given Sally the boot and returned to his wife.

Having qualified in 1983, Keele University graduate Alan Bercow has worked his way up to the higher echelons of the law and is now promoted by the old-school firm as being a leader in civil fraud cases, co-heading the firm’s fraud and asset tracing group.

According to the Stephenson Harwood website, Alan Bercow “has extensive experience of high value, complex international fraud cases”. It adds:

“He was a lead partner on the litigation between BTA Bank and Mukhtar Ablyazov and has recently acted on a six-week fraud trial in the High Court by the liquidators of a hedge fund against its former directors. He is particularly experienced in obtaining and defending interim injunctions, including world-wide freezing injunctions, disclosure orders, anti-suit injunctions and gagging orders”.

Clearly, Alan will be wishing he could have picked up one of those footballer-style gagging orders — aka, super injunctions — before the tabloid reptiles came calling.

The post City law firm partner at the heart of Westminster affair shocker appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Gateley confirms weekend rumours that it is about to set up its stall on the AIM market

Scottish nationalists may be gearing up to use their new-found parliamentary muscle to mount one more heave towards independence, but the solictiors’ profession on both sides of the border has been blending over recent years.

And now the trailblazer of Anglo-Scottish law firm mergers — the 2006 link between Midlands-based Gateley Waring and Edinburgh’s Henderson Boyd Jackson — is again making history by becoming the first UK law firm to float on the London exchange.

The firm — now simply Gateley — announced yesterday that it intends to plunge into the shark-infested waters of public ownership. A statement released this morning confirmed a Sunday Times (£) report at the weekend that the firm will launch an initial offering on the London exchange’s Alternative Investment Market, although no timetable was released.

However, it will not be the first publicly-owned law firm in the jurisdiction. That honour went to the cork-hatted Slater & Gordon, when it took over London trade union specialist firm Russell Jones & Walker three years ago. In 2007, the firm listed on its home stock exchange in Sydney.

Law firms have been allowed to float in the UK since implementation of elements of the Legal Services Act 2007, which wiped out more than 200 years of traditional partnership structures. That means the road is clear for Gateley’s senior partnership to start taking orders from housewives, plumbers, bus conductors (do they still exist?) — and of course major institutional investors, such as pension funds.

Rising profit

Gateley — which focuses on financial services, corporate, employment, pensions and property — is currently home to more than 380 fee earners across six offices in England and Scotland, plus an outpost in Dubai. It offers 11 training contracts each year.

The firm claims that over the last decade it has grown revenue by more than 14% and profit by nearly 15%. The Law Gazette went trawling through the most recent companies files for the firm’s LLP records, which showed that it had increased pre-tax profit tax in 2013/14 from £17.1m to £20.4m. That was on the back of rising turnover of some £3m, translating to an average profit-per-partner figure of £222,017, compared with £194,425 the year before.

In today’s statement, the firm’s chief executive, Michael Ward, reached for the cliché and jargon handbook:

“We believe the catalysts for value creation are now to acquire, incentivise, differentiate and where sensible diversify. These opportunities for growth will undoubtedly be most accessible as a PLC and we want to be the first to be able to take advantage of them.”

The post National law firm becomes first ever to flog shares on London stock exchange appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Signs that City graduate recruitment departments are already moving towards a training contract free for all as the regulator ditches existing guidelines

Nearly nine out of 10 law students want law firms to adhere to an agreed timetable when recruiting trainings, amid signs that City practice are breaking ranks from a voluntary code of practice.

One law firm recruitment expert has told Legal Cheek that several Square Mile players are on the verge of triggering a free-for-all scramble for talent following the professional regulators’ move to withdraw its backing for the historic gentlemen’s agreement.

It is understood that last week at least one firm was offering training contracts to second-year university students instead of waiting until the third year as the code suggests.

Understandably, wannabe lawyers are not happy. A survey released yesterday shows 89% backing among students for an existing voluntary code of conduct guiding law firm recruitment behaviour — despite the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) walking away from the code several weeks ago.

Conducting the research into the code — which was last revised in 2007 — was the Junior Lawyers Division of the Law Society of England and Wales, the Association of Graduate Recruiters and the Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services.

All three groups signalled their backing for the “voluntary code to good practice in the recruitment of trainee solicitors”, which recommends that training contract offers should not be dangled in front of law students before 1 September in their last year at university.

It goes on to suggest that TC offers be left open for at least a month before being withdrawn, and that lucky students receiving more than two offers must immediately reject those they don’t fancy.

But at the beginning of March, the SRA — which had been the fourth signatory to the code — backed away from the agreement. The SRA’s executive policy director, Crispin Passmore, maintained that it was “beyond our regulatory remit to uphold the code, as it is essentially a commitment to good recruitment practice. Our withdrawal does not reflect any view of the code’s benefits for firms or potential trainees”.

In a statement, the SRA said: “the code has always been voluntary, and universities and employers may continue to comply with the code in future if they wish”.

And that is exactly what they should do, argued Max Harris, the JLD chairman and associate at the London office of Baker & McKenzie. “The principles of the code remain valuable for both firms and students,” he said.

But there will be mounting concern that it was the regulator that provided the most oomph to the code — at least in the eyes of Square Mile law firms.

Now that the SRA has bailed out, City graduate recruitment partners might take the view that the code is relatively meaningless as it is backed only by a fairly non-descript Law Society group and a couple of outfits with confusing alphabet soup-style names.

Indeed, as Legal Cheek has reported, Clifford Chance of London’s Canary Wharf and the world had already brought forward its training contract application deadline by a month to 30 June — and that was before the SRA had pulled the plug on its backing for the code.

Previously:

Fears of trainee recruitment free-for-all as solicitor watchdog threatens to bin code of practice [Legal Cheek]

The post Students back code for TC offers timetable — law firms don’t appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Pacing yourself is essential for a long and fruitful career: in a guest post an anonymous solicitor — who writes the must-read Corporate Drone blog — sets out the tricks

1. Medieval kings would build their castles on hills

The location of your desk determines how much effort you will actually need to put into looking busy. Medieval kings would build their castles on hills as the naturally elevated land would allow the easiest defence. You must do the same with your desk. Always look for the high-ground.

The natural desk features to look for are:

Hidden screens. Only you should be able to see your screens — this speaks for itself. Your boss might not appreciate funny cat compilation videos as much as you do.

Secluded location. You do not want to be next to a walkway, a kitchen, a printer or any other area that experiences high footfall. A separate point — if you are stuck next to a printer, not only will you have to endure annoying noise and regular incursions of your territorial waters by nosey colleagues, you will also become the de facto maintenance help-desk for the printer itself. God forbid you become known as the chap who “is good with technology”.

Easy escape and entry points. You want to be able to come and go without your bosses noticing. Being late is a non-issue if you can covertly make it to your desk via a neighbouring emergency stairwell. Ideally, combine this with a tactical knowledge of the building’s back channels; this will allow you easily to escape on a Friday evening without running the risk of bumping into your superiors in the lobby.

Sadly, choice of desk is likely to be completely out of your control, unless your office is embracing a culture of “hot-desking”. In any event, always be prepared to move to a better desk if the opportunity presents itself. Keep personal belongings and clutter to a minimum. Depending the desk competition from your colleagues, it may be an idea to keep a “bug out bag” to hand so you can evacuate your old desk and colonise a new one as efficiently as possible.

2. Have a good poker face

Never say you are not busy. The ears of all partners/bosses within a 50-metre radius will prick up like a pack of Arctic wolves hearing a distant cry of distress from beached seal pup. You won’t be able to escape.

Always be as vague as possible when asked what you’re working on. You never know whether you’re going to be lumbered with a total “hospital pass” of a job or, conversely, given a really fun piece of work.

Being vague with your busyness levels gives you time to carry out some basic reconnaissance to decipher the true intentions of your boss. If you realise the job will be fun, accept it. If you realise it’s going to destroy your soul/kill your evening or weekend, then amp up your busyness façade and the job should filter down to the next sucker who wasn’t as well prepared as you.

3. Master the Inflated Time Estimate

The following approach will allow you to i) look super efficient and/or ii) bag some invaluable chill time.

If you’re asked to give a projected timescale on when you can deliver something:

a) Calculate the average required time for completion of the given task (“Genuine Time Estimate”).

b) Taking into consideration: i) the importance of task, ii) how busy you are, iii) how productive you are feeling and iv) how much you can realistically exaggerate, add 50-200% additional time to the Genuine Time Estimate (“Inflated Time Estimate”).

c) Report and commit to the Inflated Time Estimate with your superiors, clients etc.

d) Under optimal conditions you will complete the task near to the Genuine Time Estimate. You can then chose between: i) looking super productive by beating your time estimate or ii) using your time surplus to sit back, chill, browse tinder, go to the gym or just frankly space out. I’d recommend a combination of both.

4. Invest in a leather bound notepad

Appearance matters. Carrying a pen and paper will give the impression that you’re off to do something of at least mild importance … when actually you could be nipping out to the gym or off to meet a mate at Starbucks. You can stash your pen and paper on your way in and out of the building if necessary. If you’ve opted for a “sawn off” style A5 size notebook then you should be able comfortably to holster this in your jacket.

If you’re serious about deception, invest in your equipment. In the vacuum-like environment of the office, small subtleties can make a big difference. A leather bound notepad (and I’m thinking something along the lines of Tom Riddle’s diary from the Harry Potter movies) will yield better results than an discount value, ring bound, 60gsm notepad.

5. Walk really really fast

Simple but effective. Best combined with tip four above.

Be it to the printer (which, as we’ve already established, shouldn’t be next to your desk) or to meetings (real or fake), your walking speed should be f*cking quick.

Unless you’re creating air turbulence around you, you ain’t going fast enough. Unsecured paper on nearby surfaces should be blown into the air as you pass. But don’t literally run; you don’t want any beef with the overzealous health and safety brigade. One foot must be in connection with the ground at all times.

Your supersonic walking speed will add to the illusion of your busyness and will also decrease the likelihood of you being stopped by one of your bosses mid-walk. You’ll be power walking off over the horizon before their brain’s language centre has had time to formulate words.

Plus if you’re walking at the correct speed, they aren’t going to want to collide with you …

The original version of this article was published earlier this week at Corporate–drone.blogspot.co.uk. You can follow Corporate Drone on Facebook and on Twitter.

Follow @TheCorpDrone

Previously:

5 bad things about being a City lawyer that nobody tells you about [Legal Cheek]

The post 5 ways to dodge work during your training contract — and still get retained appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Big Four accountancy firm shocks recruitment market and stuns Square Mile law firms with its bid to boost diversity

City law firms were stunned into silence this week when a Big Four accountancy practice shook the graduate recruitment market by saying it would no longer pore over applicants’ A-level results.

In announcing its shock move, PricewaterhouseCoopers — the second biggest of the global behemoths by revenue and headcount — maintained ditching an obsession with A-levels would have a dramatic impact on the business’s diversity.

“It’s a move that could drive radical changes in the social mobility and diversity of the professional services’ industry and how companies assess potential more broadly,” read a PWC statement.

“The strong correlation that exists in the UK between social class and school academic performance,” continued the global bean counters, “suggests that by placing too much emphasis on UCAS scores, employers will miss out on key talent from disadvantaged backgrounds, who can perform less well at school.”

Considering that PwC, along with fellow Big Four members EY and KPMG, has recently been licensed as an alternative business structure — effectively allowing it to become a law firm — how would the development be greeted by Square Mile lawyers?

Plunging heads deep into sand, seems to be the answer. Law firms contacted by Legal Cheek either ignored the question of whether they would follow suit, or fudged the issue.

Take, for example, Linklaters, the graduate recruitment team of which handles a shed-load of applications annually and therefore has to weigh up a lot of A-level maths, English and geography results.

Linklaters sits atop the Legal Cheek Law Firm Most List for training contracts, dishing out 110 annually. Would it follow the PwC lead?

“We constantly review our selection process to ensure we are recruiting the best talent from the widest possible sources,” responded a spokesman from Links Towers in Silk Street.

“We receive a large number of application forms but still ensure we read every single one. There is no element of online screening. This helps to ensure we take into account atypical and mitigating circumstances as well as people who started to excel at a later stage in life. This is reflected in the increasing diversity of our recruits.”

Ok, but what about A-levels? Still important?

“It is not something we are currently looking at,” said a spokeswoman at Tower Bridge-based City firm RPC. “When we screen our applications, academics do form an important part of the process but we do look at applications as a whole as well.”

City graduate recruitment specialists pointed out that law firms are increasingly adopting the “CV blind” approach, with London Docklands giant Clifford Chance and private client specialist Macfarlanes being perhaps the highest profile proponents.

The CV blind technique comes in several guises, but ultimately, sight is restored and the law firm recruiters take a good long look at the document, A-level results included.

But the accountants are adamant. Explained Gaenor Bagley, who travels under the intriguing title of head of people at PwC:

“As a progressive employer we recognise that talent and potential presents itself in different ways and at different stages in people’s lives. Removing the UCAS criteria will create a fairer and more modern system in which students are selected on their own merit, irrespective of their background or where they are from.”

What’s the betting it will take City law firms some time to come round to that view …

The post City firms silent on whether they will follow PwC in ignoring A-level results appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Gateley’s move this week closer to the door of the London Stock Exchange signals the advance of yet another factor law students and young lawyers will have to confront

Think Gordon Gekko. Following developments earlier this week, he could be the future of legal practice in England and Wales, and possibly Scotland.

For those that can’t recall a pre-“The Hunger Games” period of cinema, Gekko was the creation of film director Oliver Stone for his 1987 epic, “Wall Street”. The character was everything you’d expect from a red braces-bedecked, Cohiba-puffing, blood-raw steak-eating macho stockbroker.

He took no prisoners and he paid little attention to the rulebook. Greed was not just good, it was life itself, with the generation of dosh being paramount, as Stone’s 2010 sequel left in little doubt with its title, “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”.

And now Gekko’s real-life successors will potentially have a lot more to say in the fortunes of law firms.

Anglo-Scottish practice Gateley announced at the beginning of this week that it was gearing up for an initial public offering on the London stock exchange. Since implementation of elements of the Legal Services Act 2007, law firms can register as alternative business structures, a status that opens a range of possibilities.

Many firms have become ABSs simply to allow long-standing, senior non-lawyer staff to join their partnerships. Others might be keen on a short, sharp injection of private equity investment.

But Gateley is going the extra mile, opening itself to wider shareholders and the vicissitudes of capitalisms nirvana, the market. It is the first UK-based law firm to make the move, but not the first with a big presence in this jurisdiction to list.

That honour went to Wallaby firm Slater & Gordon, which floated on its home exchange in Sydney in 2007 and three years ago Hoovered up London practice Russell Jones & Walker.

Mafia Law

The gestation of the ABS model triggered much rowing and legal profession soul searching. Doomsayers forecast that allowing external investment into law firms would effectively give the green light not just to Tesco Law, but IRA Law, Mafia Law, and — if they’d thought about them at the time Islamic State or Boko Haram Law.

So far, the doomsayers have been proved wrong. But will publicly listed law firms be a good thing for young lawyers and prospective law firm entrants aspiring to reap the benefits of a the same profession that current law firm partners enjoy?

No.

As law firms become law companies they will have to pay increasing attention to non-lawyer shareholders and investors. Institutional shareholders put the bottom line pretty high up on their agendas. That means business efficiencies.

Business efficiencies at law firms will mean cutting fat, and some might argue there’s plenty to cut at both the top and bottom ends. At the latter, that could translate to ever-greater use of non-qualified (and cheaper) paralegals based in UK regional centres, on the one hand, and good news for overseas-based legal process outsourcers, on the other.

Which means bad news for the already gradually evaporating pool of law firm training contracts.

Moves by the Big Four accountancy practices into the legal services market through conversion to ABSs are also important. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that within the decade, there will be no such thing as a global law firm. Global professional services firms providing a range of advice, some of which will be legal, will have replaced them.

Such a development will also have a profound impact on the training and development process for young lawyers as well as on the number of roles available.

So it is no wonder that, for the time being, all eyes are on Gateley. Earlier today, Thomson Reuters released survey results showing that still only a small minority of law firms are interested in floating.

According to the research, just 4% of finance directors at the top 100 UK practices said their firms would consider following Gateley to the doors of the Alternative Investment Market of the London Stock Exchange.

But, commented Samantha Steer, head Thomson Reuters’ entertainingly-titled large law strategy department:

“The Gateley IPO will be very closely watched in the profession, especially by those firms below the magic circle level who may feel that they can use an IPO to accelerate growth.”

Just whom that growth will benefit could be one of the most crucial issues for young and wannabe lawyers.

Follow @JudgeJohnHack

Previously:

National law firm becomes first ever to flog shares on London stock exchange [Legal Cheek]

The post The Judge Rules: publicly listed law firms will mean even fewer training contracts appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Exclusive: Twitter slip-up sees solicitor’s identity uncovered by Legal Cheek following anonymous Mail Online article

A shadowy former City solicitor who has put the Square Mile on edge with an autobiography detailing graphic sexual exploits during a mid-life meltdown experienced can be unveiled as former Herbert Smith Freehills and Clyde & Co litigator Andrew Caulfield.

Writing under the pseudonym of “Cory Y Standby”, Caulfield — who is now in the legal profession headhunting game — has shocked the Square Mile with bed-hopping antics that nearly rival the numbers of such renowned Casanovas as political zeitgeist merchant Russell Brand and former Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman.

The crash-and-burn tale with its City law connection has understandably caught the attention of tabloid Fleet Street. Both the Mail Online and The Mirror have pored over the mysterious Mr Standby’s salacious tale, which details a post-marriage break-up shagging binge.

But thanks to a schoolboy Twitter error, Legal Cheek can reveal that Standby is in fact Caulfield.

Advice to aspiring legal lotharios with ambitions of anonymous literary stardom: don’t favourite tweets by your nom de plume‘s Twitter account from your real Twitter account.

Notice a resemblance between @ANDYC2311 and @CoryYStandby?

In the Mail Online article on Thursday — which appeared in the website’s Femail section — “Standby” blamed a midlife crisis for his outrageous behaviour, which saw him sleep with “hundreds of women” and start affairs with strippers.

According to the article, the 49-year-old said he was working 12-hour days as a litigation lawyer at a top London firm then staying out until 5am at strip clubs in the City. But speaking to Legal Cheek, Caulfield says the story is a bit more complicated and subtle. He says the book relates how he quit legal practice when he had three young sons — two of who were prematurely born twins that required special care.

“Realising how hard it was to balance work and family life,” he says, “my divorce and wilder behaviour came a number of years later, once I hit 35 years of age, and beyond — by which time I had long since shifted from being a lawyer to my legal headhunting career”.

Caulfield read law at Leeds University some 25 years ago, before completing the old Law Society Finals exam (now the Legal Practice Course) at the then College of Law. His LinkedIn profile shows that he qualified at what was Herbert Smith in 1989, staying with the firm for four years before moving to London, Reading and Southampton firm Pitmans. Nearly two years later, Caulfield returned to City practice with shipping and insurance firm Clyde & Co.

But he left City legal practice for good in 1996, some 19 years ago, at the age of about 30. He now runs Caulfield Search, which targets the legal profession as well as having an affiliated “sports management agency”.

In his book, Standby/Caulfield paints himself as a Richard Gere-style figure — or at least the character the actor portrayed in the 1990 film “Pretty Woman”. Like powerbroker Edward Lewis, Standby claims he was a soft touch, spending thousands of pounds “saving” strippers from the indignity of the Stringfellows/Spearmint Rhino circuit.

According to the Mail Online, after splitting from his lawyer wife, Standby launched his sex campaign with an office secretary.

“We had sex in meeting rooms, toilet cubicles, on the stairs, and over the desk after hours,” he told the website.

After finishing with the secretary, Standby told the paper he really picked up the pace:

“I went on plenty of random dates, having casual sex, one night stands and seeing girls from work.

“One girl I picked up from a club queue I took back to the office. But when I cleaned up and took the bin out, I didn’t realise the used condom had fallen out. The next morning there was uproar in the office when it was found hanging off the stairs.”

Makes a change from discarded billing report print-outs.

The book — titled “50!: The Life, Loves & Psyche of a Male Mid-life Crisis: Volume 1: The Journey” — is published through vanity publishing experts Xlibris. It is currently only available via Amazon, but Standby/Caulfield maintains it could still end up in bookshops.

The post Exposed: mysterious lawyer charting conquests in sex autobiography is ex-Herbert Smith and Clyde & Co appeared first on Legal Cheek.

But is former East Anglia employment partner actually being led to electoral slaughter?

It has been a rollercoaster few days for lawyer political party leader hopefuls.

First, the former Herbert Smith (as was) man and the darling of Streatham in south London, Chuka Umunna, twigged that if you put yourself forward to lead Labour, the press will take an interest in pretty much every aspect of your life.

Umunna is understood to have been particularly worried that his solicitor girlfriend, Alice Sullivan, was under the spotlight. It was claimed that not only were journalists interested in the Lewis Silkin employment specialist herself, but the reptiles were also door-stepping her parents and her 102-year-old grandmother.

Therefore, less than 48 hours — which let’s face it, is hardly much time to let the heat build — after the ex-City lawyer threw his hat into the ring, Umunna jumped out of the kitchen. Now Sullivan can return undisturbed to protecting large corporations from the demands of the sort of boiler-suited workers that used to represent Labour’s core vote.

Charming man

Following Umunna’s wobble and tumble, Labour legal profession devotees turned their attention to a potentially bigger future star, Sir Keir Starmer. “The Charmer” is a former Director of Public Prosecutions and current silk at one of London’s most fashionable chambers, Doughty Street.

Despite Labour’s national drubbing in the general election, Sir Keir waltzed into parliament in one of the party’s safest seats, London’s Holborn and St Pancras. In an advertisement for the power of ostensibly left-of-centre barrister candidates, Starmer boosted Labour’s majority by more than 7,000 votes to a stonking 17,000-plus.

No wonder, then, that acolytes and Charmer groupies concocted a Twitter hash-tag — #keirforleader — and started beating the tom-toms for their man to storm Labour HQ in Brewers Green in Westminster.

But on Sunday the Clark Kent look-a-like disappointed housewives of all political stripes by announcing over The Twitter that he wasn’t a runner.

V flattered by #keirforleader initiative and thanks for so many supportive messages but Labour needs s/one with more political experience.

— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) May 17, 2015

Tea and sympathy

That means legal profession hopes in the party leader stakes are now reduced to the fortunes of Norman Lamb (who he? Ed), who is standing for the top job with the Liberal-Democrats (who they? Ed).

Lamb received a law degree from Leicester University before going on to become an employment law partner at what is now Norwich and London firm Steeles Law.

Although he probably won’t want to be reminded, Lamb held a couple of portfolios in the last coalition government, first being employment relations minister in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills before moving over to take the Health Department’s role of minister for care and support.

The Lib-Dems certainly need all the care, support, tea and sympathy they can muster, but whether Lamb is the man for the job remains debatable.

The solicitor just managed to hold his North Norfolk seat, thanks to a strong third place showing by Ukip, which was likely to have prevented the Conservatives from taking the honours.

And depending on which turf accountant you prefer, fellow Lib-Dem Tim Farron is the clear favourite to be chosen to pick up the party pieces. Farron is currently quoted at about 7-1 on, while the legal profession’s last chance is seen as a 4-1 outsider.

Previously:

Move over Justine — here comes Alice [Legal Cheek]

Will a lawyer win Labour Party leadership battle? [Legal Cheek]

The post Chuka ‘no’ shocka, Sir Keir declines – only Lamb remains as lawyer party leader candidate appeared first on Legal Cheek.