Spring2013


an English court in the event of a dispute. We in the Square Mile are the major beneficiary of this state of affairs; it is thought that around 90% of commercial cases handled in London now involve an international party. With London accounting for a quarter of the country’s private practice firms and employing almost 45% of all solicitors, it is safe to say that those practising in the City of London are the people who are driving and sustaining this very positive trend.


This has created not only a very healthy business for law firms within the Square Mile itself but a situation where English law firms have been able to expand their operations all over the world, to areas as diverse as Singapore, Moscow, Hong Kong, the UAE, Tokyo, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and further. The amount of revenue that is generated by London’s firms in exporting English legal knowledge is around £3 billion.


Perhaps the most important point is that the legal sector accounts for around 2% (a staggering £23 billion)


of the UK’s Gross Domestic Product. This is even more staggering when you realise that these sums are being generated by the 120,000 solicitors on the roll who hold practising certificates and their assistants.


The Future?


Within the litigation sector the Jackson reforms represent a huge challenge and an equally huge opportunity. Those firms that have grown dependent on litigation funding and personal injury work will have to restructure and attempt to shift into other parts of the litigation market. If they cannot then they will find themselves on the hard end of the maxim “evolve or become extinct”. For firms that are smacking their lips waiting for the juicy prospect of conducting big ticket commercial litigation in which their fees under damages based agreements will go into the millions, the future is very bright indeed.


Perhaps the biggest opportunity that the reforms have created is presented to junior to middle ranking solicitors in


the litigation departments of City law firms. Many partners who are focussed on management, marketing or both will come to rely on them to get to grips with the new cost budgeting procedures and forms of client care agreements. Those who perform this function the best will firmly establish themselves as future contenders for partnership. They may even have the best chance to lead the trend which the profession has been crying out for – the development of a truly commercially aware legal generation.


Undoubtedly, the Jackson reforms arriving at this point in the economic cycle cannot be encouraging for those at the junior end (or even, edge) of the profession, but the figures do not lie and they paint a picture in which large numbers of solicitors are employed and are generating large amounts of money in London to the benefit of the profession and the country. Lord Denning once told us all that the law, like the Ritz, is open to everyone, and in the post-Jackson era that sentiment will remain as true as on the day that it was uttered.


Left to right: Lauren Gaffney (Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom UK LLP), Team Captain, Melanie Gedge, Michael Hatchard (Skdadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom UK LLP), and Jamie Cusworth (Watson Farley & Williams LLP).


Inter-Livery Swimathon


The City of London Solicitors’ Company entered this year’s Inter-Livery Swimathon, which was held at The RAC Club at Woodcote Park in Epsom on 4th March, in aid of the Lord Mayor’s Appeal.


Team Captain, Melanie Gedge (Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom UK LLP), led the rest of the CLSC team in valiantly completing a distance of 5000 metres, despite being one team member short. In addition to their swimming efforts, they also raised just under £5,000 in sponsorship for the Lord Mayor’s Appeal. Our congratulations to them all.


City Solicitor • Issue 81 • 7


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