Figure is down from 25% in 2011

Nearly one in five lawyers would ditch their jobs in order to appear on BBC business reality show The Apprentice.

This figure — which has been obtained by research from legal recruiter Laurence Simons — seems surprisingly high, but it actually marks a decrease on the results of an identical 2011 survey when 25% of lawyers said they’d quit their current roles in return for the chance to impress Lord Sugar on national TV.

The 18% of lawyers willing to swap everything for The Apprentice glory — and follow in the footsteps of last year’s unsuccessful legal duo Felipe Alviar-Baquero, formely of Slaughter and May, and Lauren Riley, a St Albans family solicitor — is also less than equivalent figures for accountants.

31% of beancounters would be willing to take this extreme step. When asked this question four years ago just 21% of accountants answered this way.

What can we take from these findings, which were drawn from surveying 300 legal and accountancy professionals?

Well, Laurence Simons reckons they can be explained by a change in the prize for winners of The Apprentice that was brought in from 2011. Before this, victors got a £100,000 a year job, but after they received a £250,000 investment in return for a 50% stake in a new company that they would launch.

This has put off less entrepreneurial lawyers, believes the recruiter, but appeals to go-getting accountants.

The boss of accountancy recruiter Marks Sattin, which helped out on the survey, has gone one step further, arguing that the results suggest that accountants will soon conquer the legal profession. Over to Marks Sattin chief Dave Way:

With the 2011 Legal Services Act opening the doors for the Big Four accountancy firms to build up their legal services divisions, the tables have turned in the last four years with accountants now showing more willingness to take risks than lawyers. Accountants may truly become the chameleons of the professional services world.

Alternatively, the survey could simply show that accountancy is a worse job than law — and people who do it are, for whatever reason, generally more susceptible to the questionable charms of kitsch reality TV.

There was support for elements of this theory in last night’s opening episode of the 2015 show, in which some of the hapless contestants tried to flog salads for £9 a pop. Lawyers do their best to relate to this stuff, but ultimately it’s a struggle for them.

Not sure what's more of a rip off. A £9 salad or my statute book. #TheApprentice #LawStudentProblems

— Law Student Problems (@LawVicissitudes) October 14, 2015

Previously:

What, no lawyers on this year’s The Apprentice!? [Legal Cheek]

The post 18% of lawyers would quit their job to go on The Apprentice appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Geeks try to bring some light relief to the escalating conflict in the Middle East

A viral image of a Palestinian lawyer kicking a tear gas canister during a heated protest has resulted in the most unlikely online battle among Photoshop geeks.

The demonstration — that took place near Ramallah, West Bank, earlier this week — was arranged by the Palestinian Bar Association.

In a show of solidarity, lawyers in the territory joined locals in protesting about the alleged recent killings of Palestinians by Israeli forces.

A photo of one of the lawyers in full court dress volleying away a tear gas canister then swept social media — and has since spurred a bizarre online competition.

The premise of a Photoshop battle is to out-do fellow ‘Redditors’ by Photoshopping an individual into different scenarios for comic effect.

User WookieTurnip edited the lawyer so it appears that he’s kicking a football.

Meanwhile, an anonymous user felt the robed lawyer was doing some sort of dance move.

One Photoshop pro allowed the lawyer to join the president of the United States of America, Barack Obama, in a game of bowling.

Finally, a Redditor placed the Palestinian lawyer in a hurdling race.

Legal Cheek sincerely hopes that the effect of social media levity will bring both sides to their senses as tensions in Israel and Palestine increase.

Read the thread in full below:

A Palestinian lawyer, wearing his official robes, kicks a teargas canister back towards Israeli soldiers during a demonstration by Palestinian lawyers [Reddit]

The post Protesting Palestinian lawyer becomes unlikely star of Reddit Photoshop battle appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Personal Support Unit assisted 5,000 clients in 2008 — now number is a terrifying 50,000

The Personal Support Unit (PSU) is on track to help a total of 50,000 clients per year by April 2016, a sharp increase from the approximately 5,000 assisted in 2008-9, the year of the financial crisis.

Backed by top judges such as Lord Neuberger and Lord Dyson, the PSU offers free support to court users facing civil and family cases without legal help. Many of the volunteers are law students.

Figures published in the PSU’s newly released annual report for 2014-15 show the extent of the incredible growth in demand for the charity’s volunteers.

Total clients helped per year by the PSU

The total number of clients helped bobbed along throughout the noughties — and even for a few years after the collapse of investment bank Lehman Brothers and the ensuing financial crisis.

But a dramatic upturn occurred in the years following the major legal aid reforms which began in 2012. The total number of clients helped increased sharply to more than 20,000 in 2013-14, reached nearly 40,000 the year after and is set to hit 50,000 in 2015-16.

Family law disputes — which make up half of the PSU’s workload — have seen some of the biggest rises, increasing from around 10,000 to 15,538 last year. Other major areas of work for the PSU include money claim cases, about which the charity’s volunteers advised 6,343 clients last year, and housing, which saw 5,572 clients advised upon.

Legal Cheek caught up with PSU’s interim boss, Nick Gallagher, and asked him what all this means for law students and junior lawyers.

Gallagher was quick to make clear that the function of his organisation is to coordinate a positive response to the legal aid cuts, explaining:

We respond to the need that the client presents. The work we do is driven by the need presented by the client. We are responding to a reality that more people cannot access legal aid.

He also pointed out that PSU volunteers do not give legal advice, and are therefore able to signpost litigants to other organisations, be that free legal advice services or fee-charging professionals.

Interestingly, Gallagher is hopeful that the PSU is having a positive effect on the employability of law students. The organisation is the country’s biggest provider of in-court work experience, offering what it describes as “hands-on experience of court life”.

Gallagher added that a survey of former PSU student volunteers showed that 69% felt that working with the PSU had helped secure employment in the legal sector, with 84% saying that they felt volunteering with PSU had helped them to improve their client skills.

With the PSU expanding across the country — it’s already in most major cities and is planning to add four to five new court units per year — there are increasing opportunities for students to volunteer. You can find out more here.

The post Key litigant in person charity sees incredible 900% rise in clients helped appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Firm’s refusal to comment on matter gives credence to gossip

International law firm DLA Piper has this morning declined to deny rumours that one of its top partners is under investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) over sexist comments.

Sport and media law specialist Nick West hit the headlines last year when private emails which he sent to Premier League boss Richard Scudamore were leaked. They included advice to Scudamore to “save the cash in case you find some gash” — an apparent reference to women.

In another, West — whose firm profile photo doesn’t obviously mark him out as laddish type who is also sexually irresistible — boasted in reference to a female colleague: “have spent all day fending Edna off my graphite shaft. She is terribly relentless isn’t she?!”

Despite widespread calls for West’s head, DLA opted to stand by him — not least, it has been suggested, because he is one of the firm’s top rainmakers, hauling in huge amounts of money each year for the firm.

This is the statement DLA issued at the time:

We have concluded that there was a failure to meet the high professional standards in which we take pride as a firm, whilst recognising that these were emails exchanged between friends and accessed without permission. We have accepted Mr West’s assurances that these emails are not reflective of his beliefs and values and that there will be no recurrence of this behaviour.

West also issued an apology, in which he said that he “let myself, my firm and its clients down”, adding: “I give my assurance that this will be the case going forward.”

Basically, it did the trick. And as the media turned its attention to other news, West seemed to be in the clear.

Until this week, when gossip began circulating that the SRA had — rather belatedly — launched an investigation into the DLA Piper lad.

This morning legal blog RollOnFriday published a report of the rumours. And Legal Cheek has since followed up with a phonecall to DLA — which politely declined to issue a comment.

The SRA was similarly coy, providing us with this statement:

We do not usually comment when matters are on-going. It is only if disciplinary or regulatory action is necessary that our work becomes a matter of public record.

The post DLA Piper silent on rumours that partner who described women as ‘gash’ is under investigation by the SRA appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Lawyers are getting the hang of crowdfunding

Posters campaigning to save the Human Rights Act have appeared across the London Underground, thanks to a successful crowdfunding campaign run by a number of well-known lawyers.

The emotive posters have been funded by the £55,870 raised by ‘Act for the Act’ — a campaign launched by Doughty Street Chambers‘ barristers Caoilfhionn Gallagher and Martha Spurrier to combat the Conservative Party’s promise to scrap the Human Rights Act.

Human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith OBE and children’s rights campaigner Anna Edmundson, amongst others, have also shown their support for the project.

The initial £50,000 target set by the group was surpassed in just a month — emulating the highly successful billable hours for refugees campaign by Sean Jones QC — thanks largely to chunky donations from Doughty Street and Garden Court Chambers. Law firms such as Bindmans and Hodge Jones & Allen have also shown their support and contributed.

The posters feature real-life stories from ordinary people who have relied on the Act to challenge the law.

You won't know you need #HumanRights until you do. Glad to see these around @actfortheact #HumanRightsAct pic.twitter.com/G7uDIUYPgG

— Caterina Franchi (@Cate_Fran) October 15, 2015

Eagle-eyed law students may recognise some of the cases. One poster features Hughes Cousins-Chang, whose Article 8 challenge prompted a change in police protocol. Another tells the story of Catherine Smith, who was able to obtain crucial documents about her son’s death following an Article 2 challenge. Act for the Act hopes that these posters will:

Fill a gap by reaching out to all members of the public, many of whom voted for the Conservatives in the General Election or do not read the newspapers which print positive human rights stories.

Now that the initial target of £50,000 has been reached, Act for the Act has set a stretched target of £100,000, which will enable the campaign to spread both beyond The Tube — and the M25 — into the regions.

You can tweet your support for the campaign using the hashtag #ActfortheAct and can find out more about the campaign on their crowdfunding website here.

Follow @actfortheact

The post Pro-Human Rights Act posters appear all over the Tube after barristers raise £50k to ‘Act for the Act’ appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Exclusive: Head of Supreme Court wants to see judiciary out on campus but is against imposing diversity quotas

The most senior judge in England and Wales has called on his fellow members of the judiciary to help promote diversity by visiting non-Russell Group universities to encourage students to apply for training contracts and pupillages.

But Supreme Court head Lord Neuberger is against using quotas to change the make-up of the legal profession, whose members continue to disproportionately hail from privileged backgrounds.

Speaking at Legal Cheek‘s ‘Why the legal profession needs people who see the world differently’ event — a video of which is here — Neuberger backed the recent enthusiasm shown by many big law firms to reach out to students at universities outside the Russell Group.

But he acknowledged that this was often beyond the means of smaller firms and barristers’ chambers with limited resources.

This is where the judiciary could lend a hand as part of a broader legal profession strategy to “think outside the box” to a greater extent when it comes to graduate recruitment, said Neuberger. He explained:

I think one role for judges who don’t have to worry too much about recruiting is that we should be going out to the universities and the schools where people are not necessarily so aware of the opportunities and are often rather reticent about applying to firms and chambers.

Neuberger went on to praise the contextual recruitment techniques being adopted by City firms including Herbert Smith Freehills, Hogan Lovells and RPC — all of which were represented at the event — to help them find talented students from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds.

Commenting on RPC’s related policy of taking at least two candidates each year on its vac scheme who don’t meet the firm’s graduate educational requirements, Neuberger said:

Taking people on vacation schemes who may not be particularly academically successful or would not normally have applied is the sort of thing that firms should be doing. Because we do have to think outside the box and do have to be thinking about going to institutions where people are not motivated and knowledgeable because they are disadvantaged from the first base.

He continued:

We need to get [disadvantaged students] aware of what is going on and more confident about applying — and getting ready for applying. It’s not just applying out of the blue, you have got to be prepared … you have to know how to make yourself attractive and how to perform in interviews.

It is these methods, rather than quotas, that Neuberger — who spent an hour speaking to individual students in the networking session after the event — hopes to see employed over the years ahead to make the legal profession more diverse. On fixed diversity targets, the Supreme Court chief had this to say:

In a sense we have targets — the very fact that we are saying there is insufficient diversity means that we are accepting there is a target because we haven’t reached it. In the sense of having a specific target, I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, it concentrates the mind; on the other hand it is a bit artificial … the more we start headlining with targets, the more in a way we start compartmentalising people rather than emphasising diversity.

Neuberger proceeded to describe quotas as “patronising and self-defeating”, commenting:

The other problem with targets is that they can quite easily shade into quotas. They have obvious attractions, but in end I think they are patronising and self-defeating. I’m quite comfortable with the way we are proceeding; namely, conscious that we have insufficient women and BME people at the top — both of the legal profession and in the judiciary.

According to the Legal Cheek Careers Firms Most List, in 48 out of 60 top law firms the percentage of partnership positions filled by women is less than 25%, while the Chambers Most List shows 42 out of 50 top barristers’ chambers have less than a quarter female QCs.

The Firms Most List also shows that the partnership of only four out of 60 firms reflect the proportion of ethnic minorities in the British population, with 14% or more ethnic minority partners. Most chambers do not even harvest comprehensive racial diversity data. Meanwhile across the legal profession socio-economic diversity is generally scetchy, but research has found that as many as 40% of young lawyers at top firms and chambers have been privately-educated.

The full video of ‘Why the legal profession needs people who see the world differently’ is here.

The post Lord Neuberger: Top judges should visit non-traditional unis and encourage students to apply for training contracts appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Did the students bring dangerous weapons into City law firm?

The London office of international law firm Pinsent Masons has undertaken a “thorough review” of its security procedures after six of the firm’s CV workshop students started a huge knife fight that put part of the Square Mile on police lockdown.

The incident — which took place during a busy lunchtime back in February 2014 — resulted in six arrests and three men requiring hospital treatment. Rocks, clubs and knives are all reported to have been used.

But it only emerged today, via report on Court News, that those involved had been attending a course at Pinsent Masons. When asked this afternoon by Legal Cheek if the students had brought weapons into the firm, it declined to respond in full but did admit that “a thorough review of arrangements for engagements of this type” has since taken place.

The fight apparently began when Almahda Ali, 22, Raheem Simon, 20, and Perry Jessep, 20, fell out with three other Pinsents CV clinic attendees, Aaron Taylor, Ridwan Ibrahim and Khalid Youssef, all 19.

Run in conjunction with charity Tomorrow’s People, the workshop — that aims to get disadvantaged people back into employment — soon spilled into an all out royal rumble after a disagreement between the young men in the area near the firm’s City of London premises.

After leaving the Crown Place offices of the corporate law giant — presumably with impeccable CVs in hand — it appears that pleasantries were exchanged, resulting in a brawl that left lawyers and bankers fleeing for their lives.

The melee — which saw, among other things, Simon reportedly deliver a kung-fu inspired kick to someone’s head, before being stabbed himself — brought the Bishopsgate area of the City to a standstill for over four hours while forensic examiners (pictured below) carried out a search of the scene.

With weapons including clubs, knives and rocks being used in the attack, it would raise questions as to whether the youths involved were tooled up inside Pinsent Masons’ office while attending the CV event.

A spokesman for Pinsent Masons told Legal Cheek:

We treat the safety and security of our people with the utmost seriousness and, while we cannot comment upon the exact circumstances surrounding this event, we have undertaken a thorough review of arrangements for engagements of this type.

He continued, underlining the firm’s commitment to continuing to promote diversity:

We are proud of the work we have done with Tomorrow’s People over several years to help and support some of the most disadvantaged young people in the UK. This matter highlights both the scale of the challenge faced, and importance of the work that Tomorrow’s People and similar organisations undertake to meet it.

The post Pinsent Masons conducts ‘thorough review’ after CV workshop students start Square Mile knife brawl appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Watch ‘Legal Cheek Live, with Lord Neuberger’ below

Lord Neuberger and a host of top lawyers gathered on Thursday at Lincoln’s Inn to discuss diversity in the legal profession at Legal Cheek Live.

Fletchers‘ Ed Fletcher, Hardwicke‘s Andy Creer, Hogan Lovells‘ Tom Astle, RPC‘s Parham Kouchikali and Herbert Smith Freehills‘ Veronica Roberts were joined by representatives from diversity organisations Urban Lawyers, the Black Solicitors Network, Aspiring Solicitors and Rare — who were brought together at the event by sponsor LexisNexis.

An audience of nearly 200 law students asked the panellists questions on class, gender, race and disability in the context of a changing legal market, in a discussion chaired by Legal Cheek‘s Alex Aldridge. Watch the video in full above.

After the event the panellists all hung around to chat to the students over drinks and nibbles, with Lord Neuberger proving a particularly popular draw.

Lord Neuberger speaking to students at #legalcheek live this evening

A video posted by Legal Cheek (@legalcheek) on Oct 15, 2015 at 12:37pm PDT

The Supreme Court president even appeared on a post-discussion podcast recorded by Queen Mary University of London’s law society.

Listen to the full Legal Cheek-Queen Mary Law Society podcast here.

Previously:

Lord Neuberger: Top judges should visit non-traditional unis and encourage students to apply for training contracts [Legal Cheek]

The post Video: Why the legal profession needs people who see the world differently appeared first on Legal Cheek.

12 trainees out of 47 head for the exit at Walkie Talkie-based firm

DWF has revealed an autumn retention figure of 74%, with 35 out of a training cohort of 47 opting to remain at the firm.

The 13-office firm — that offers around 50 training contracts annually — revealed the majority of this year’s new associates will be based in the outfit’s London and Manchester offices.

The remaining newly qualified (NQ) lawyers will be spread across DWF’s Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Glasgow outposts. Newly qualified lawyer pay varies across the firm’s offices between £36,000 in Scotland and £59,000 in London.

The national giant — that was the first law firm to take up residency in Britain’s “ugliest” building, the Walkie Talkie (pictured above) — revealed that 20 of its NQs will be based in corporate and banking. Six are heading to the firm’s real estate team; litigation will receive five new associates and the remaining four will begin life as lawyers in DWF’s insurance team.

DWF has, over the longer term, traditionally posted strong autumn figures, retaining all of its trainees on four occasions since 2002.

However, with the acquisition of Cobbetts in 2013 and mergers with, among others, Scottish practice Biggart Baillie and Birmingham outfit Buller Jefferies, trainee numbers have swollen to unprecedented figures.

This has had a negative impact on DWF’s retention figures in recent years, with around 20% of its legal talent heading for the exit each year since 2012. This autumn’s 74% rate is a slight drop on that average, and is down seven percentage points on last year’s figure of 81%.

DWF’s emerging talent manager Kate Hasluck expressed disappointment at the result, which she put down to some unusual circumstances involving individual trainees. She explained:

Our aim is always to retain as many qualifying trainees as possible because we have invested so much in them so this figure is disappointing and doesn’t reflect our commitment to trainees, however unfortunately in this instance we had a number of trainees who had their heart set on a particular practice area and we didn’t have sufficient roles to cater for demand, or trainees couldn’t stay with us due to personal reasons including relocation to another part of the UK where we don’t have an office. Our retention rates are normally very high as we look to give our trainees good exposure to clients and involve them in quality client matters and anonymous feedback from our trainee population supports this.

It is fairly common for law firms that have grown rapidly to post lower retention rates as they consolidate their businesses.

Earlier this month, international firm Clyde & Co — which like DWF has undergone a series of relatively recent mergers and now takes on 50 trainees a year — announced a drop in its retention rate from 98% last year, to 76% for the autumn 2015 period. But Clyde’s recent retention rate average remains 90% after a succession of strong results over the last few years. That is the sort of level DWF will be aiming for over the years ahead.

The post National firm DWF hangs onto 74% of its qualifying trainees appeared first on Legal Cheek.

300 French advocates stage courthouse coup

Hundreds of French lawyers have staged a protest outside a Lille courthouse, preventing judges, defendants and witnesses entering the building.

The lawyers, who are protesting against legal aid cuts, gathered around the various entrances to the court from around seven this morning, creating a human wall that prevents anyone gaining access.

Extraordinary images — courtesy of French news site La Voix Du Nord — show riot police arriving at the scene and wrestling with the robed lawyers in an attempt to regain control of the building.

With police managing to move some of the lawyers from the entrances of the building this afternoon, French advocates changed tactics and staged a mini-occupy movement.

Footage circulating on social media in the past few hours (embedded below) shows lawyers chanting, ringing bells and blowing trumpets from inside the courthouse, while police look on helplessly.

Ayé on est à l'intérieur et l'extérieur pic.twitter.com/uws1qIowDY

— Tinkerbell (@Tinkerbell_ring) October 20, 2015

So far, though, there has been no repeat of the wall made of legal practitioner’s texts (pictured below) that French lawyers built last year to block access to a court in the city of Nantes.

Hopefully the French lawyers will provide inspiration to their English counterparts. Occupy the Old Bailey anyone?

The post Wrestling, trumpets and a court occupation: French lawyers show world how to strike appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Full statement of ex-bid assessor emerges online

A former Legal Aid Agency (LAA) insider has alleged that inexperienced temps with no knowledge of the criminal justice process have been responsible for allocating key government contracts to law firms.

The LAA denies the claims, but the furious firms are gearing up to take legal action.

According to Freddie Hurlston, former head of criminal justice system initiatives at the Legal Services Commission, temps from Brook Street temping agency assessed criminal law firms’ bids for crucial state contracts. These are the lifeblood of such outfits as they desperately battle to survive looming funding cuts.

The government-led process is slashing the number of firms able to represent arrestees in police stations and magistrates’ courts from 1,600 to 527 — so the stakes are high.

Firms which had applied for the contracts found out on Thursday whether they had succeeded. However, just one day before “D-Day for legal aid”, the agency was rocked by Hurlston’s accusations of botched administration.

The ex-bid assessor came forward with shocking allegations about the agency’s approach to the 1,000 bids received — via this document, which has since emerged online.

Freddie Hurlston Statement (Full)

Hurlston claims that the staff hired to award the contracts were from Brook Street temping agency, and had no previous knowledge of the public funding procedure.

He also alleged that the rookies received “very limited” training before being let loose on the applications, and said they were paid £9.30 per hour for their work. Hurlston raised concerns, too, about the Legal Aid Agency’s heavy focus on quantity over quality, reporting that staff faced dismissal if they did not assess 35 questions a day.

In the wake of these allegations, the Legal Aid Agency has come forward to defend its assessment process as “robust and fair”, issuing this statement:

The Legal Aid Agency strongly denies these allegations. We followed a robust and thorough process in assessing duty tender bids. Assessors received comprehensive training to ensure transparent, consistent and fair treatment of all applications and the assessment process was subject to careful moderation and management at all stages.

But disgruntled solicitors are, unsurprisingly, not convinced. According to Bill Waddington, the chairman of the Criminal Law Solicitors Association, a “tsunami of litigation” against the agency is in the pipeline.

As pointed out by blogger David Allen Green, it seems rather unfortunate that the Ministry of Justice “could legally bungle-up a procurement exercise for ‘legal services’ where every aggrieved bidder can and will sue.”

Solicitors associations the Law Society, the Criminal Law Solicitors’ Association and the London Criminal Courts Solicitors’ Association are yet to officially back a public law challenge.

Brook Street did not respond to Legal Cheek‘s request for comment.

For updates on the latest developments, follow the whistleblower’s Twitter feed.

Follow @HurlstonFreddie

The post Temps on £9.30 an hour decide which legal aid firms survive, claims whistleblower appeared first on Legal Cheek.

The balance of power has shifted, says top academic

The stereotype of the corporate lawyer as the intellectual and highly paid hotshot who is respected by all is under threat, as new research by a top legal academic shows City law firms’ clients are routinely asking the impossible — and getting away with it.

An oversaturated legal market, which has already seen a host of mergers, has left desperate law firms willing to do almost anything to satisfy increasingly outrageous demands, reckons Birmingham University’s Steven Vaughan.

Three-quarters of the 53 lawyers interviewed for Vaughan’s study said they were forced to accept more challenging terms with little room for discussion, with many noting that the “balance of power had shifted” from firms to clients.

Big corporations and financial institutions were identified as the bosses in the new emerging order, which has formed largely since the 2008 financial crisis. It is defined by terms of engagement outside the control of ever more submissive law firms.

Sometimes, the study suggests, big banks are even weighing in to decide which law firms advise other parties on their deals.

The research highlights specific areas where things have changed. They include restrictions on who law firms act for — with some leading clients now barring firms from representing other companies.

Faced with the threat of losing the big client, increasingly meek partners are obediently following orders — meaning they are losing work and as a result probably have to push their junior associates even harder.

Another area is freebies. Rather than pay for tax advice, corporate clients are making firms responsible for providing this extra on a “non-negotiable” basis. Giving the advice often involves all sorts of checks on anti-corruption rules that the law firms really should be charging for. Again, this translates as longer hours for the worker bees.

Birmingham University’s study comes amid a wave of recent City law firm pay rises, as top practices battle to keep hold of associates who have become disillusioned at the long hours and stress of their jobs.

The problem seems to be getting worse, with research conducted over the summer finding that millennial lawyers are getting sick of their jobs even faster than previous generations.

The post Status of City lawyers is declining as desperate firms bend to satisfy clients’ outrageous demands appeared first on Legal Cheek.

England & Wales’ 151,692 solicitors and barristers breathe sigh of relief

To celebrate Back to the Future Day, this morning we shared this image on social media from Back to the Future II, in which Doc and Marty travel forward to October 21 2015.

With cuts to legal aid, #BackToTheFuture wasn't far off… pic.twitter.com/7dNWYIh8cC

— Legal Cheek (@legalcheek) October 21, 2015

Since then, the 14 second moment where Doc reveals to Marty that lawyers have been abolished has appeared on YouTube.

Marty:

Within two hours of his arrest, Martin McFly junior was tried, convicted and sentenced to 15 years in the state penitentiary. Within two hours?

Doc:

The justice system works swiftly in the future now that they have abolished all lawyers.

Happily, Legal Cheek can confirm that, according to official Bar Standards Board and Solicitors Regulation Authority figures, there are currently 135,976 practising solicitors and 15,716 practising barristers in England & Wales.

The legal aid cuts may be set to drive some of this lot away, while legal process outsourcing and even artificial intelligence will likely swallow up more lawyer jobs over the years ahead. But for now the law remains a pretty well-populated profession.

The post Back to the Future’s end of lawyers prediction at least a century too early appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Speculation that 1% levy on turnover of top 100 firms could be introduced

Lord Chancellor Gove’s growing reputation as a left-leaning reformer could be cemented by a new tax that he is apparently planning to hit top City law firms with.

Uneasy with the much maligned court charge brought in by his hated predecessor Chris Grayling — which is basically a way of getting more money from poor people — but also under pressure to balance the Ministry of Justice’s books, Gove has had a bright idea.

According to a report in this morning’s The Times (£), the government is considering scrapping Grayling’s scheme to extract money from guilty defendants in favour of a 1% levy on the turnover of the top 100 corporate law firms.

The article is light on detail, but given that the Lord Chancellor used to work as a journalist at The Times before going into politics, it may be worth taking seriously.

Perhaps most importantly, the report recalls comments made by Gove in June when he noted that “justice is not just a marketplace — it is a community” and urged big-earning corporate lawyers to “look into their consciences” and do more pro bono work. If this didn’t happen, Gove added that legislation was “always open to us”, with proposals for a “lawyers’ levy” apparently already drafted.

The court charge — which is already proving difficult to enforce given how broke many convicted criminals are — is expected to pull in between £65 million and £90 million annually, while the mooted City lawyer tax would boost the Treasury’s coffers by a much larger £190 million. So there is method in Gove’s liberal madness.

Nevertheless, any bid by the government to hit corporate law firms in the pocket is likely to provoke serious opposition. After all, the likes of Clifford Chance have on-site swimming pools (pictured below) to maintain.

In fairness to the City firms, despite their occasional extravagances, they are huge business success stories that in 2013 were collectively responsible for generating an impressive £22.6bn — equating to a not insignificant 1.6% of total UK GDP.

And the government has been among the first to boast about this, celebrating the nation’s corporate legal profession at events like the Global Legal Summit. So City lawyers will have a fair bit of leverage in their negotiations with Gove if he does try to introduce his “lawyer’s levy”.

Quick off the mark, City of London Law Society chief Alasdair Douglas, who is the former senior partner of Travers Smith, came out against the plan this morning, commenting:

Suggestions of a special tax on only one section of the community to pay for a public service seems intellectually unsustainable.

Gove has won widespread praise in the left-leaning media of late for his rehabilitation-focused prison reform plans and more constructive engagement with lawyers over the legal aid cuts.

The post Michael Gove wants to tax City lawyers and use money for legal aid appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Mini motorbikes, a little police officer and of course those famous talons of justice

US lawyer Bryan Wilson, aka the Law Hawk, has released a third instalment to his YouTube-led self-promotion campaign — and it’s possibly his craziest to date.

For those unfamiliar with the young lawyer, he shot to fame late last year for his unique take on how to market his legal services.

From yelling “talons of justice” at the camera to catching fish with his bare hands, Wilson’s two adverts so far have left those at Legal Cheek HQ baffled and amazed in equal measure.

The Texas-based criminal defence lawyer — who prides himself on providing “aggressive legal representation” — released his latest YouTube offering earlier this week. However, uninitiated viewers be warned: it’s extremely strange.

The advert opens with Wilson straddling a mini-motorbike with a US flag mounted to the back. The young lawyer addresses the camera saying, “due process, do wheelies”, before attempting the one-wheeled stunt.

Law Hawk

Having paused briefly to offer some useful facts concerning the drink-driving laws in the state of Texas, the advert then quickly descends into madness once again.

The Law Hawk can be seen bursting through a window on his mini-moto to defend a client who calls him on his special “hawk-phone”.

Law Hawk

Wilson then smashes a breathalyser machine, revealing a dwarf police officer inside, who appears to be manipulating the readings.

View post on imgur.com

Legal Cheek isn’t sure how Wilson will top this latest advert, but don’t bet against the hawk-obsessed attorney having a go.

Watch the advert in full:

The post The Texas Law Hawk is back — and more bizarre than ever appeared first on Legal Cheek.

South London coffee shop told to remove sign from exterior of building immediately

Owners of South London-based café “Fuckoffee” have been issued with a legal threat by their landlord, demanding the immediate removal of their “offensive sign”.

The letter — that was issued by London firm SA Law on behalf of the property owner — has now appeared on social media courtesy of the café’s official Twitter account.

The legal threat, received by the Bermondsey café owners earlier this week, claims the rude sign that appears to have been erected without the landlord’s permission constitutes “trespass”.

The strongly-worded letter continues, requesting Fuckoffee owners to:

…immediately remove the sign above the Property shop front “Fuckoffee” and make good any damage caused to the exterior of the building.

If the café owners fail to do so? Well it appears the landlord is happy to go to court, with lawyers telling the coffee shop proprietors:

…our client will have no option but to remove the sign themselves or issue court proceedings seeking an injunction requiring you to remove the sign.

Support for the café has already gained momentum online, with a petition being hastily set up to save the sweary-sign and the British sense of humour more generally.

It’s not clear how “Fuckoffee” owners intended to proceed, but with a crudely drawn penis covering the law firm’s letter head, it would appear they’re taking the matter seriously.

Read the letter in full:

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Magic circle giant gets serious about northshoring trainee-level work

Freshfields‘ new strategy of sending basic legal work up north is moving to the next level — with the firm doubling its office space in Manchester.

The venerable corporate outfit only arrived in the UK’s legal process outsourcing capital in spring, but so successful has its time been in the city that it has just put pen to paper on 80,000 sq ft of space in One New Bailey, a new development on the edge of business district Spinningfields.

Eagle-eyed legal market watchers will note that the new office is twice the size of Freshfields’ current Manchester office, located above the rather less glamorous Arndale shopping centre, which is just 40,000 sq ft. The firm will make the switch between the premises in early 2017.

Make no mistake, this is significant.

Manchester is currently buzzing with legal sector innovation, led by firms including Berwin Leighton Paisner, Addleshaw Goddard and DWF. Among this group there is a start-up spirit, with manager-led teams of paralegals working separately to the rest of the firm — often on short term contracts — on trainee and junior lawyer-level work that is sent up from head offices in London.

Each time the work comes in, strategists tinker with delivery methods to maximise efficiency as the paralegals — many of whom are recent law graduates from the local area — use specially designed templates to complete trainee and junior lawyer-level work with only basic training.

If you are a boss, being among all this is thrilling. But it’s less fun if you’re one of the grinders, desperately hoping that what you’re doing could lead to a training contract.

The arrival of Freshfields earlier this year as the first magic circle firm in Manchester was a big deal, setting the city alive with gossip that there was about to be a paralegal pay war amid a shortage of labour. That has never happened — there are a lot of jobless graduates around these parts.

Instead, Legal Cheek understands that the firm’s eyes have been opened to the huge possibility to save cash that exist by sending low-level legal and non-law tasks outside London — with the success of the last few months evidenced in the decision to double office space.

Playing things cool, Anup Kollenathu, the boss of Freshfields’ Manchester operation — dubbed its ‘Global Services Centre’ — commented:

One New Bailey gives us both the high quality and attractive location we want for our staff. The developer has granted us valuable flexibility to adapt, up or down, the amount of space that we would occupy to reflect the evolving needs of our clients’ and our business.

Freshfields offers 80 training contracts each year, all in London. This figure is down from a pre-financial crisis high of around 100. Don’t expect numbers to increase in the capital any time soon while the firm is expanding up north.

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But will it save the Human Rights Act?

A video by lobbying group RightsInfo that explores “everything you need to know about human rights” in just two minutes has racked up nearly 30,000 views on YouTube and 40,000 views on Facebook in a week — which is quite a tally for a law-themed clip.

Created by young One Crown Office Row human rights barrister Adam Wagner, RightsInfo is described as:

[A] space [where] anyone can come and learn about human rights, and have fun doing it.

Now that we are approaching what Wagner describes as a “crunch point” in our human rights history — the Tory government is desperate to scrap the Human Rights Act (HRA) and replace it with a British “Bill of Rights” — RightsInfo is keen to keep the debate rolling. The rookie barrister explains:

I want RightsInfo to improve public understanding of human rights and inspire people to talk about human rights in a different way.

The video (embedded above) — entitled ‘Human Rights Explained In A Beautiful Two Minute Animation’ — has been praised by a number of prolific legal figures since it went live on 14 October.

Colin Yeo, a public law barrister at Garden Court Chambers, described it as “excellent”, while legal commentator Joshua Rozenberg and human rights advocate Bianca Jagger also tweeted their support.

Human Rights Explained In One Beautiful Two Minute Animation. We must protect the #HumanRightsAct https://t.co/2jII3ZyuL2

— Bianca Jagger (@BiancaJagger) October 20, 2015

The RightsInfo video comes as a host of other barristers from Doughty Street Chambers, another human rights set, have banded together to crowdfund a campaign to ‘Act for the Act’. It has seen ads backing the Human Rights Act appear all over the Tube and, most recently, on billboards in London.

#ActfortheAct billboards in Hackney! Great to see such important stories being told. @martina_baines @actfortheact pic.twitter.com/FaSYYlNdDK

— CaoilfhionnGallagher (@caoilfhionnanna) October 21, 2015

Yet there is concern that the movement to ditch the HRA being led by Lord Chancellor Michael Gove — a skilled communicator who began his career as a journalist — may be gaining traction.

Notably, last weekend the left-leaning The Independent newspaper, which has previously supported the HRA, ran an editorial “In defence of Michael Gove’s plans” for a Bill of Rights that surprised many observers of the debate.

Follow @rights_info

The post ‘Beautiful’ human rights animation goes viral (well, viral for a law video) appeared first on Legal Cheek.

Government’s continued disdain for the law raises temperature of human rights debate

A number of top lawyers have voiced their outrage at the government’s amendment of the Ministerial Code — which comes as part of a pattern of Tory hostility to legal protections and process.

The Code is a key government document that sets out the rules and standards expected of ministers. If a minister fails to comply with the Code then he has failed to comply with his ministerial duties, and could face being sacked by the Prime Minister.

Last Thursday, the government quietly published the updated 2015 version of the Code — and in doing so ditched a key part relating to international law. Until then, the general principles of the Code were laid out in the opening paragraphs as follows:

The Ministerial Code should be read against the background of the overarching duty on Ministers to comply with the law including international law and treaty obligations and to uphold the administration of justice and to protect the integrity of public life.

The paragraph now reads:

The Ministerial Code should be read against the background of the overarching duty on Ministers to comply with the law and to protect the integrity of public life.

So the explicit duty to comply with international law and treaty obligations and to uphold the administration of justice are now no more — and lawyers are furious.

Solicitor and writer David Allen Green has condemned the government for celebrating Magna Carta, a historical document with no enforceable legal rights, while simultaneously stripping down more modern rights instruments. Via his @JackofKent Twitter account, he wrote this morning:

Regard to international law Human rights law Legal aid Freedom of information Judicial review Every check to Executive is being dismantled.

— Jack of Kent (@JackofKent) October 26, 2015

Dismissing the possibility that the amendment was a semantic tidy-up, Green stressed the importance of the Code’s amendment:

The clue to the importance of the reference to "international law" in Ministerial Code is the keenness of Cabinet Office to get rid of it.

— Jack of Kent (@JackofKent) October 26, 2015

Can the government simply alter the law like this? Writing in The Spectator, Nick Cohen reckons not. The UK has signed thousands of treaties, he notes, arguing that ministers cannot decide what treaty obligations they can and cannot follow.

As we enter a pivotal point in our human rights history, Cohen believes that the amendment is a thought-out attack on the government’s commitment to the European Convention on Human Rights. He continues:

If the Conservatives wanted to leave the European Convention on Human Rights, they should leave it. They could not, however, sign an international treaty, and then say, ‘stuff it, we won’t abide by clauses we don’t like’.

But the government is standing its ground. It has stated that the amendment is not a substantive change to the Code — and, as a result, is legal.

However, David Cameron’s cause hasn’t been helped by the former head of the government’s legal service, Paul Jenkins, who this morning wrote a letter to the Guardian in which he accused Downing Street of showing “contempt for the rule of international law” by changing the Code. Lifting the lid on his time in government, Jenkins revealed:

As the government’s most senior legal official I saw at close hand from 2010 onwards the intense irritation these words caused the PM as he sought to avoid complying with our international legal obligations, for example in relation to prisoner voting. Whether the new wording alters the legal obligations of ministers or not, there can be no doubt that they will regard the change as bolstering, in a most satisfying way, their contempt for the rule of international law.

The next step in the row will be a legal challenge, with human rights group Rights Watch UK announcing that it will take Cameron and pals to court. The group rejects the government’s position because:

[T]he amendment to the Ministerial Code was explicitly mentioned in the Conservative Party Proposals for changing Britain’s Human Rights Laws. This amendment clearly signals a marked shift in the UK Government’s commitment to complying with international law.

Rights Watch will be writing to the government shortly to ask for the previous version of the Code to be reinstated. This promises to be an interesting battle.

The post Why lawyers are so angry about the quiet change to the Ministerial Code appeared first on Legal Cheek.

High profile junior barrister says boozey bonding blocks female influence — but figures suggest other causes may be to blame

Sexism row barrister Charlotte Proudman has blamed university drinking societies for the lack of women lawyers as she continues her journey from the family bar to becoming an established media commentator.

Despite women outnumbering men at trainee level — 42 out of 60 of the firms in the Legal Cheek Most List recruit more women graduates than men — Proudman reckons that it is a student culture of male-only boozey bonding that is limiting equality in the legal profession.

Writing in the Guardian today, she argues:

University-based drinking societies are the perfect training ground for young boys seeking entry to the old boys’ club. The existence of drinking societies is the antithesis of equality, and widening inclusion and access to Oxbridge. Women are locked out of them, and later effectively excluded from proportional representation in heavily male-skewed professions (law, politics, finance, etc), which are dominated by the elites that have been established at university.

Her words, which are part of a slightly rambling article headlined ‘Port and prejudice — drinking societies are the dark side of Oxbridge’, will surprise many for failing to acknowledge the very different gender diversity issues affecting the top of the legal profession and its junior ranks.

In contrast to the entry-level figures, in 48 out of our 60 law firms the percentage of partnership positions filled by women is less than 25%, with top chambers even more male dominated at QC level.

The cause of this is typically cited as being related to child-bearing, childcare and work-life balance areas not mentioned by Proudman. The young barrister, however, has addressed this point in recent previous Guardian articles in which she called for quotas to be brought in by firms and chambers.

Where 27 year-old Proudman, who is currently studying for a PhD at Cambridge while maintaining a tenancy at Mansfield Chambers, may have a point about the booze clubs is in relation to the junior bar — which is quite different to law firms when it comes to gender equality.

Of the 50 sets featured in the Legal Cheek Chambers Most List not a single chambers contains more female juniors than male juniors, with a mere five chambers surpassing the 40% women mark. At 14 out of 50 chambers women make up less than a quarter of junior barristers.

Previously:

The Charlotte Proudman generation backs quotas, but Lord Justice Leveson says they are ‘demeaning’ [Legal Cheek]

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