More needs to be done to attract young Derry lawyers into high street practices, committee told

Sinn Féin MLA Ciara Ferguson suggested graduates are being ‘snapped up by pharmaceutical, research and financial services companies’.

"This is coming from what I hear in the neighbourhoods and communities and from knowing a lot of young people, given that my kids are all in their late 20s.

“A lot of their friends studied law, and all of them, because of their analytical skills, have been attracted into the private sector and the likes of financial services, even my kids. They do not see law as being attractive. There is therefore a piece of work to do there.

“In Derry, we have a fantastic law degree programme, with young graduates coming out of it. They are being snapped up straight away, however, by the likes of pharmaceutical, research and financial services companies, because they pay a good salary, are local and are offering nine-to-five jobs. I am conscious that there is a bigger piece of work to do on how we can provide the profession with encouragement and support,” Ms. Ferguson told a briefing of the Stormont Justice Committee.

She was responding to testimony from Darren Toombs, Law Society President, who spoke of a dearth of young lawyers at many local high street law firms.

"If, unfortunately, you happen to be arrested for something, the solicitor who turns up in your custody suite will probably be over 40, and probably even over 50. It will not be someone in their 20s or 30s.

"The people are just not coming through. In the past month or two, we saw one of the leading criminal legal aid firms in Belfast, which has been a very well known name for the past 50 or 60 years, close down,” said Mr. Toombs.

David Lavery, Law Society Chief Executive, told the committee it was vital high street practices were sustained.

"There are about 3,000 solicitors in private practice in NI at the minute, and more than half of them are female. When I started training, many years ago, 17% of the class were female. This year, 71% are female. It is therefore becoming a female profession.

"Those solicitors' expectations are different. They want to work in large commercial firms, because those firms' offer is better. We therefore have this remarkable economy of two extremes: on the one hand, Belfast has more large international law firms than anywhere outside the City of London, which is remarkable, and there are alternative legal service providers that hoover up graduates by the hundred, but, on the other hand, just over half of our firms are still one- and two-solicitor practices.

"Those are the high-street firms. The problem is that, if we do not sustain the high-street firms — legal aid is one of the income flows that they need — they will go,” he said.

Mr. Lavery said legal aid payments were a vital income stream for high street firms.

“We have an economy of extremes. The commercial guys will be fine. They will look after themselves, I have no doubt. The high-street solicitors and the local access to justice will probably be the biggest problem,” he told the committee.

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