Having been hit in its Middle East offices, Trowers & Hamlins has now launched a redundancy consultation in the UK. This is likely to affect four fee-earners from their real estate’s plot sales team. Three employees in Manchester and one in Exeter face the chop but the London office remains unaffected.

Following the announcement of a redundancy consultation at Denton Wilde Sapte in January, The Lawyer reports that a number of employees from their Milton Keynes office proposed to slash their wage packets rather than see their colleagues face the axe. The initial proposal would have seen all team members take a 12 per cent salary cut over a period of eighteen months. It is understood that when this proposal did not receive management endorsement, representatives instead proposed that all Milton Keynes property employees take an indefinite salary cut of 10 per cent. However, this was not accepted and the plan failed to go through leaving the redundancy programme to run its course.

Towards the end of last week, it emerged that Clifford Chance had been offering voluntary redundancies alongside its fomal redundancy consultation. Up to 50 employees are believed to have taken them up on the offer!

Finally, to end on a more cheerful note, a bit of good news on the employment front. US outfit Bracewell & Giuliani (of Rudi Giuliani, Republican ex-Mayor of New York fame) had a good 2008 and have decided to bolster their London office with the addition of another partner and an associate. Happy days…