Much has been made of the top legal earners recently and a new report suggests that top City lawyers can earn up to ten times the national average for those in the legal profession.

The national average earnings are estimated at approximately £50,000, whilst the average amongst the top earners at City firms tops £500,000.

Dickinson Dees has begun redundancy talks with three of the four departments in its volume business.

Approximately 165 staff, including a number of qualified solicitors, are employed by its volume arm ‘d3,’ which deals in remortgage, conveyancing, repossession and loss recovery and Home Information Packs (HIPs).

The legal costs in ­Formula 1 chief Max Mosley’s five-day privacy suit against the News of the World are likely to hit £1m.

Mosley took legal action against the newspaper after it managed to secretly film him participating in a sex orgy. Mosley’s legal team claimed that his privacy rights were breached.

Oh dear, the top 40 City firm per equity partner profits dropped to £755,000 from last year’s figure of £817,000, but the firm did manage a small increase in turnover, with revenue lifting through the £80m mark.

Less for more; looks like the credit crunch is really biting.

A Legal Week Big Question survey found that "94% of respondents believe commercial lawyers have some level of image problem within the business community,"

[converted from legalese to english* "solicitors make crap businessmen".]

An announcement on the Clifford Chance intranet page “London Today” explained: “There will be an annual price rise in the restaurant, Deli, Budgie [bar] and vending machines of 6 per cent. The price of food served in the restaurant in the evenings will now be the same as during the day. These changes are against a background of rising food prices.”

A senior Clifford Chance partner said: “The restaurant is not a profit centre. Whilst I regret that we have to …