The latest salary survey by the Law Society reveals that male solicitors earn more than females. The survey on gender and ethnicity published last week found that male solicitors earn on average 6% more than their female counterparts.

This year’s survey, which has dug far deeper than last year, shows that there is no evidence to substantiate that ethnicity, on its own, explains any part of the variation in pay.

Taking into account no controls for other factors, including grade, PQE, …

Solicitr has received information that West End firm, Mishcon de Reya, has launched a second redundancy consultation.

A spokesperson for the firm confirmed  that: " Mishcon de Reya has entered a consultation period across select areas in the firm to fully assess where redundancies might be made and where it is able to redeploy resource elsewhere in the firm."

A consultation was launched last December that resulted in 17 employees being laid off in January.

The news follows the release …

The last piece of the magic circle jigsaw has fallen into place with the announcement of Allen & Overy’s results. A&O has generated a seven per cent increase in global turnover to £1.091bn for the 2008-09 financial year compared to £1.016bn the previous year. However, profits per equity partner fell 9% to £1m from £1.122m the previous year. Over 50 per cent of A&O’s turnover comes from outside the UK meaning results have been boosted by the fall in …

Blame culture, it’s everywhere. If you’re not getting the blame at work you can bet your getting the blame as a lawyer for something. The ambulance-chasing variety seem to have managed to get the whole profession tarred with the compensation culture brush and blamed for nannying health and safety rules. Perhaps then by the same logic lawyers should be praised for the advent of the following snippets of entertainment provided by local councils cowering in fear of …

You’ be forgiven for thinking that there are no shortcuts to a legal career but there may be one – become a prince first. Prince William was called to the bar in a ceremony at London’s Middle Temple where he was also called to the Bench, the ancient Inns of Court’s governing body.

The Prince is the sixth member of the Royal Family to be made a Royal Bencher, following in the footsteps of the Queen Mother, and his mother …

Shoosmiths has reported a marginal drop in turnover for 2008-09 from £103.4m to £99m, a fall of 4 per cent. Profits per equity partner however have seen a huge drop from £327,000 to £150,000 a plunge of 54%. This is the largest drop to emerge from a top 50 firm so far.

Meanwhile US firm, Weil Gotshal & Manges, has opted to cut salaries in its City office. Newly qualifieds finishing their training contracts in September 2009 will see their …

Even as training contract opportunities diminish, the ranks of wannabe lawyers continue to swell. Research from Sweet & Maxwell found that there had been a 150% increase in the number of applications per training contract vacancy this year. The competition to secure students on courses is being fought hard by course providers.

BPP Law School has signed an exclusive LPC deal with Reed Smith. The school will be the sole provider of the course to all of the firm’s future trainees. …

Mixed results trickle through again this week…

Charles Russell has seen a sight fall in turnover of 3%, down from £71m to £69m but profits per equity partner have been hit much harder, falling from £368,000 to £235,000 in 2008-09, representing a 36%, decline.

Meanwhile, Hill Dickinson has seen fee income increase by 12% over last year from £73m to £82m. Despite this PEP fell six per cent for the same period from £312,000 in 2007-08 to £294,000 in 2008-09.

And Mishcon de …

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Linklaters have followed swift on the heels of Clifford Chance in releasing their 2008-09 financial results. Revenue at Freshfields was £1.29bn for the year and profit per equity partner came in at a solid £1.44m. It is understood that turnover was significantly enhanced by exchange rates with nearly 60 per cent of the firm’s revenue in euros or dollars. Handy. Linklaters just pipped Freshfields’ revenue though at £1.3bn but slipped behind on PEP with a …

This will either make you cringe or laugh or maybe a bit of both. In the week following the King of Pop’s death we have see much media coverage and hysteria. Never far from a lawyer’s reach in life, the superstar singer looks set to have an ongoing relationship with many more in death with the wrangles over his estate. Despite his regular proximity to the legally versed we don’t imagine it was the inspiration for his music but …

A tough week for the world’s largest law firm…

Clifford Chance shut up shop in Budapest earlier in the week – the firm’s Hungarian partners are set to spin off into Lakatos Koves & Partners.

And now the firm has announed its financial results ahead of its Magic Circle rivals. Revenues for 2008-09 have come down 5% from a high last year of  £1.329m to £1.262m. Meanwhile profits per equity partner have dropped significantly from £1.156m last year to £733,000 this year, a …

A bit of intra-profession sniping…

June Venters, who in 2007 became the first female to be made a solicitor QC has told the Gazette that as a solicitor HCA she has experienced hostility and rudeness from barristers and judges before and since becoming a silk. ‘I’ve come across some charming judges and barristers, but there are others who are clearly prejudiced and have made that known to me – it’s just a fact of life.’

It seems that barristers are …

The clue should be in the title, Judge Gerald Price QC, a senior circuit judge no less. One assumes the judiciary are chosen partly (a fairly significant part you’d hope) on their ability to reason the facts, consider the legal implications and make a sound judge ment.

A  recent News of the World article "Court in the Act ", would beg to differ in the case of Judge Price however. The paper claimed that the 60 year old judge, who …

We like to keep an eye out for laws of the land being put to good use…

A seven strong coffee morning for over 50s which has met at Eye Library in Eye, near Peterborough, Cambridgeshire, every Tuesday for the last four years without incident have had their meetings axed by concerned council officials reports the Telegraph .

The conscientious health and safety officers banned the outrageous meetings claiming that toddlers from a …

Denton Wilde Sapte will only be offering 17 out of 31trainees places when they qualify in September 2009 and Taylor Wessing is set to retain 13 of 24 trainees due to qualify in September. For both firms that represents only a little over half of their trainees at 54%.

Other firms in the City have seen retention rates falling including magic circle firms Allen & Overy, Clifford Chance and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer although retention is still fairly strong at around …

The quietest week we’ve had on the redundancy front for a while and along comes the sad news of two celebrities dying in one day to cast a cloud. Farrah Fawcett, ’70s pin up and star of Charlie’s Angels probably got some partners’ hearts racing back in the day but her passing might not be quite as well remembered following the news of Michael Jackson’s death. Whatever one thought of the King of Pop, celebrities don’t come much bigger.

The …

A sad day for fans and celebrity lawyers alike. Michael Jackson was never far from a legal battle particularly in his latter years. He may not have been the best at settling his fees but he must have employed more lawyers than your average partner over his life-time.

So its goodbye to the King of Pop.

Competing for glamour with the Oscars and only missing the tear-filled speeches as lawyers, overwhelmed with emotion, thank everyone under the sun for their success; its The Lawyer awards. Everyone loves a good award ceremony; if actors can do it so can lawyers – some mutual back slapping combined with a few drinks. The Lawyer had its 2009 annual awards on Tuesday night and there were plenty of winners (not least because there are no less than 26 categories). …

The £22m credit-crunch related bill handed to the Treasury by Slaughter and May has been heavily criticised by the Lib Dems. The figures were released following a parliamentary question and showed that Slaughters was paid £22,150,000 for ‘financial stability related’ advice during 2008/09.

Lord Oakeshott, the Lib Dem Treasury spokesman, said: ‘This payment is simply mind blowing. It comes to £175,000 for every single equity partner of the law firm.

‘How can the Treasury defend allowing the firm to run up …

Causing excitement on the international front, City firm Norton Rose has announced that Deacons Australia will join Norton Rose Group. This will be a significant boost to the firm’s presence in the Asia Pacific region which many predict as set for a boom when things improve. The combined practice will be called Norton Rose Group and will take effect from 1 January 2010.

On the stats front, the new Norton Rose Group will have a turnover of more than GBP420m …