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Lawyers in Local Government hits out at planned cut to number of members on Law Society Council

Lawyers in Local Government has hit out at Law Society proposals to cut the number of seats on its council dedicated to the sector from two to one.

Concerns have also been expressed at Chancery Lane’s plans to recruit the seat directly, rather than as now where it receives a direct nomination from LLG following a competitive recruitment exercise.

“Such a reduction of seats and lack of direct nomination could completely disenfranchise public sector lawyers. It is in the best interests of the profession as a whole, that the Law Society remains truly representative,” LLG warned.

The changes are part of the last phase of the Law Society’s internal governance reform and stem from proposals to reduce the number of council seats from 100 to 75.

All in-house seats are to be reduced to establish four in-house non-corporate seats classed as 'sector characteristic seats'. The local government sector will get one of these seats.

A decision is expected to be taken in October 2019.

LLG, which is asking members to provide it with their views on the plans, highlighted how in 2017 there were 4,488 local government solicitors holding practicing certificates on the roll of solicitors – representing 3.2% of the profession.

“To be proportionately represented, LLG's position is that the local government sector would continue to require two seats on the council with ideally both, but at least one being directly nominated by LLG,” it said.

LLG gave the following reasons for this standpoint:

  • LLG and its predecessor company, SLG, had a long history with the Law Society, having previously been a recognised body in receipt of grant funding. "However, the Law Society created its own 'in-house' division in 2013, incorporating all the in-house sectors including corporate into one division and SLG merged with ACSeS to create LLG. We retained the two council seat nominations (as we historically always had) whilst the Law Society worked through its 4-year governance review. LLG was formed to provide a voice and sector specific support including bespoke training and guidance. Since that time, it has moved strongly into national influencing and campaigning in areas such as Brexit and the National Graduate Recruitment Scheme. The In-house division within the Law Society however has a strong focus on the corporate in-house sector."
  • Engagement through its directly nominated council seat representatives had enabled and informed knowledgeable local government solicitors to advocate on behalf of the sector directly with the Law Society. LLG warned that an individual appointment outside of the arena “might be unwilling to engage with LLG or indeed just lack the breadth of sector knowledge which comes from exposure and involvement with LLG”.
  • The way in which the Law Society intended to structure its council into 'segments' sectors and work-types had the effect of reducing the weight attached to the numbers of solicitors in a sector and the value and/or legitimacy of their national representative body. “Local Government employ a significant number of the profession and there are some unique aspects of the working environment for those solicitors which needs to be properly represented within the Law Society, otherwise it will become irrelevant to that chunk of the profession.”
  • LLG is representative of the sector by virtue of its elected office holders and branch structure, “and it would seem logical that we continue to make nominations to the council utilising an open and transparent recruitment process”.

LLG also said the proposals more widely appeared to diminish the influence of other sectors not just local government including central government, health and not-for-profit organisations. “This begs the question whether it follows greater weight has been attached within the proposals to city firms and larger private practice?”

LLG has asked its members to send their views/comments to Helen McGrath at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. They are asked also to indicate in their response whether or not they are a solicitor.