The benefits of legal services frameworks

To those of us who work in the legal sector the severity of the funding pressures faced by local authority legal departments across the UK are well known. Indeed, it could be said that, “reduce, reduce, reduce”, has been their clarion call over the last few years, a state that’s likely to continue if, as the Local Government Information Unit’s 2026 State of Local Government Finance Report, “…indicates that 15% of the sector are likely to need Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) this financial year, with 39% expecting to do so within the next five years.”

Yet when the options to either sink or swim seem so stark, local authority legal departments have repeatedly shown their mettle, spurred on by their shared purpose of providing legal advice, assistance and support to their authorities and the communities that they serve.

Enter legal services frameworks, which came into their own after the introduction of the Legal Services Act 2007. Solicitors’ frameworks are by far the most common and are a lifeline when local authorities do not have either capacity or the specific expertise to do the work themselves. By harnessing the combined spending power of collaborative procurement, local authorities have turned to frameworks to access top-flight legal advice that fits their needs and budgets, and ensures that local authorities remain compliant with public procurement law and the Procurement Act 2023. At Kennedy Cater we are proud to procure and manage some of the UK’s most successful local government and social housing frameworks.

A Barristers Framework is, however, an altogether rarer thing. Whilst barristers are consistently used across the public sector for a range of advocacy and specialist advisory services, few frameworks are in operation and fewer still are proactively managed with the end users’ specific needs at their core. As the company that started it all with the procurement of the (LBLA) London Boroughs’ Legal Alliance Solicitors Framework back in 2009 followed by the Barristers Framework in 2012, we have developed critical knowledge around what ultimately makes a framework successful, including crucial parameters that we can monitor and report against such as; how often is it used, money spent, savings achieved, quality of service delivery, adherence by suppliers to the framework’s terms, and value added and social value benefits delivered. Our frameworks all offer management options which enable us to ensure the framework works hard to consistently meet its original goals.

A prime example of how a group of local authorities can come together to achieve these benefits is the West Midlands Local Authorities Barristers Framework, awarded in September 2026. Led by City of Wolverhampton Council as the contracting authority, a group of ten local authorities asked Kennedy Cater to establish a dedicated Barristers Framework with an ongoing management element, including regular spend and savings analysis and reporting. In discussion with the participating councils, we developed a procurement specification with the Framework divided into nine Lots: Adult Social Services, Children’s Services, Governance & Public Law, including Education, Criminal Litigation & Prosecutions, Housing & Civil Litigation, Planning, Property, Employment, and Licensing, with four to eleven chambers appointed to each Lot.

Successful chambers were required to demonstrate the expertise and depth of their advocacy and advisory services, extensive value-added and social-value benefits, competitive fixed fees and hourly rates and efficient chambers administration with the aim to provide transparency and cost certainty for the participating authorities. Procured under the new Procurement Act 2023, the Framework allows instructions to be made either by direct award using the new Most Advantageous Tender (MAT) criteria, or via mini-competition. The urgency of the vast majority of requirements is likely to mean, however, that as with other Barristers Frameworks managed by us, the vast majority of instructions will be on a direct award basis. With each instruction subject to the Framework Agreement terms and conditions, the streamlined call-off process and fixed fee pricing helps to maintain consistency, transparency and increased efficiency. The framework is non-exclusive, so although participating authorities are able to instruct outside of it, and because the framework specification was developed to match the authorities’ particular requirements, the expectation is that the framework will be the authorities’ default solution.

At Kennedy Cater we are constantly in touch with local authorities across the UK, as we know the huge benefits frameworks can bring and we are keen to replicate them where possible. The West Midlands Barristers Framework came about through the sheer dedication and commitment of City of Wolverhampton Council and their colleagues from the partners at Birmingham City Council, Coventry City Council, Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council, Shropshire County Council, Stratford-on-Avon District Council, Telford and Wrekin Council, Walsall Council, Warwick District Council, which recognised that if they worked together, then their combined purchasing power had the ability to open doors to high-quality specialist legal support that provided trackable value for money for the public purse. They had seen the work we have done in London since 2009, with the London Boroughs’ Legal Alliance, and we started a conversation, listening to their concerns, needs, and expectations and determining together what their ideal framework looked like. Our whole process is collaborative with our Public Sector team of Director, Tim Morel, General Manager, Richard Short and Procurement Consultant, Daniel Haynes, placing themselves in the centre of many internal discussions about how best the West Midlands’ needs could be achieved. There then followed a series of workshops for each potential Lot, to further refine the specification and reflect the particular requirements of colleagues in each practice area before the tender was published, including bespoke quality questions, pricing schedules and weightings.

In many respects a Barristers Framework operates in a similar way to a Solicitors one, and certainly if Kennedy Cater are managing the framework day to day, then we follow a similar approach. This approach centres around helping framework users achieve the full efficiency benefits and cashable savings available, through optimal use of the framework, by ensuring that suppliers consistently provide services and benefits in line with the Framework terms, including the pricing. This approach includes pro-active management of the relationship between local authorities and chambers and, where necessary, dispute resolution. The approach also extends to centralised management and analysis of spend data, delivery of training and other Value-Added and Social-Value Benefits, maintenance of the Framework documents and the regular assessment of chambers’ performance. The latter allows both Framework users and chambers the opportunity to share feedback on performance, the relationship between users and chambers and the operation of the Framework, with a view to ensuring continuous improvement.

We are often asked, what do barristers get out of this? After all, isn’t a framework intended to drive down prices, allowing users to get more for less? Our answer is absolutely! That is after all why we formed Kennedy Cater over 20 years ago. We were the first disruptors in our field, banging on the door of tradition, trying hard to break in. But it’s important to recognise that getting barristers chambers to buy-in to the framework isn’t all sacrifice; getting onto a framework, especially one like the newly procured West Midlands Barristers Framework, really does represent a significant opportunity to access a strong and varied body of work, from committed partners, in a relationship that is dynamic, and proactively managed to get the best for both sides. In essence it is and must be a win win, to ensure the long-term commitment of all parties to the relationship, and the successful re-procurement of the Framework in four years’ time.

Kennedy Cater is comprised of a close-knit group of exceptional people all motivated to work towards achieving our clients' goals.