The legal scene
clearly, those interested in working in the law should be engaged with the subject over the months and years ahead. Diversity in the profession Looking inwards, the legal profession is still nowhere near as diverse or as accessible to the range of people that it should be, especially the Bar, although important progress has been (and is being) made in some areas. BAME representation in the solicitors’ profession Some 21% of solicitors in England and Wales have a BAME background, according to the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s (SRA) latest statistics, with little variation according to seniority – 20% of partners in law firms are also BAME. However, there are differences in representation at senior levels when looking at firms by size. The largest firms (50 or more partners) have the lowest proportion of BAME partners – only 8%. This contrasts with small single-partner firms, 34% of which are run by a solicitor from a BAME background. The overall proportion of BAME partners in law firms has remained the same since 2014, which reinforces the perception among critics and equality advocates that the elite end of the solicitors’ profession still has a lot to do to show that it is serious about equal representation. Gender equality in the solicitors’ profession According to the Law Society, women have made up more than 60% of entrants into the solicitors’ profession since 1990. Women make up just over half of practising solicitors, but only 27% of partners in private practice. Clearly, law firms need to do more to promote and retain women to reverse the trend – highly noticeable within some organisations – of women leaving practice after having children.
process and many law firms are increasingly adopting all three. Another measure that the profession is attempting involves specific gender targets, which the Women in Law pledge, launched by the Law Society, Bar Council and Chartered Institute of Legal Executives, demands of firms that sign up. Of course, with the pledge only voluntary, its effectiveness remains to be seen. What should focus minds are the gender pay gaps at firms across the profession, but particularly at the largest and wealthiest firms. An analysis by The Times shows that women working at the 10 largest firms are being paid 43% less on average than their male colleagues. The national median average wage gap is 9.6%. BAME representation at the Bar Just under 13% of practising barristers in 2018 were from BAME backgrounds, according to the Bar Standards Board (BSB), with the figure rising to 16% among pupil barristers. On the surface, it might seem that inaccessibility at the Bar is a smaller problem than it is made out to be, as at the last Census in 2011, 14% of the UK population was BAME – roughly in line with pupillage figures. But a deeper look at BPTC graduate and pupillage figures reveals a different picture. BPTC student and blogger, Blessing Mukosha Park, told LawCareers.Net in June: “I have had a lot of rejections in my quest for pupillage and have lost count of the number of times that I’ve been told ‘don’t worry, it’s a numbers game’ in the feedback I’ve received, but when you look at the statistics, that explanation becomes much harder to process. According to the BSB, of the 1,351 people called to the Bar in 2017-18, 741 were from BAME backgrounds and 586 were white. Compare this to the numbers who started pupillage in the same period, which show there were just 71 BAME first-six pupils to 390 white pupils. These figures further reinforce the extremely unfortunate perception of the Bar as an elitist
Flexible and agile working, mentoring and networking are vital aspects of that
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