Within four years, law will be dominated by females – but will it submit to real change?
LAW is going to become a female-dominated profession in terms of numbers of practising solicitors within four years, according to figures from the Law Society of Scotland.
Currently, 43 per cent of Scotland’s 9,919 practising solicitors are female, but two-thirds (66 per cent) of entrants into the law last year were women.
According to Neil Stevenson, deputy director of education and training at the Law Society of Scotland, women are expected to become the majority by 2012. In England and Wales the picture is broadly similar.
However, the evidence suggests that on current performance, few are likely to reach the top of the profession. At present, women account for only 21.8 per cent of the 3,632 partners in private practice in Scottish law firms.
Dr Nick McKerrell, a law lecturer at Glasgow Caledonian University, who wrote a report into women in the legal profession for the Law Society of Scotland and the Equal Opportunities Commission in November 2005, said: “The gender swing in the law has been far greater than in any other academic discipline over the past 30 years.
“In the 1970s, only about 5 per cent to 10 per cent of people studying law were female, and women were completely barred from studying law at all until the 1920s. The sociological shift did not occur until much later in law than it did in other disciplines.
“There used to be a belief that this massive surge of women into the profession would somehow force a change of work patterns but that hasn’t happened. The idea persists that the definition of commitment is to put in long hours.”
McKerrell says the danger is that women get sidelined from consideration for partnership roles merely because of their wish for a better work-life balance; because they want to play a bigger role in raising their families, or are less willing to go along with the long hours culture than male colleagues.
The very nature of corporate work means that some specialised corporate firms, such as Dickson Minto and Dundas & Wilson, remain at the beck and call of large business clients, which for the foreseeable future means many staff will be required to work long and unpredictable hours.
It may be for this reason that Dickson Minto has what’s thought to be the lowest male-female partner ratio in Scotland. Only one of its 18 partners is female.
Sheila Gunn, a partner in law firm Shepherd & Wedderburn, said: “I don’t think at the top tier this is a profession that lends itself to regular working patterns. This is a client-driven profession which, unlike medicine, does not have a captive market so it is harder for us to change.
“If young women are choosing to study law because they think law is a family-friendly profession that’ll give them scope for working flexible hours, they are deluding themselves.”
Amanda Jones, partner in Maclay Murray & Spens, said: “The legal profession is changing, but slowly. The Law Society/Equal Opportunities report identified that there are issues that need to be addressed.” She added that firms have to look at each request for part-time and flexible working on individual merits. “Unless firms make themselves attractive to women they will not get the best candidates.”
McKerrell believes it will be a long time before law firms are run by women, for women. “The empirical evidence suggests it’s not going to happen. As well as the pay gaps, we identified big attitudinal differences as to whether there are barriers to women’s careers in law firms. Whereas the men generally didn’t believe there were any, most women believed there were.”
The research showed that whereas 70 per cent of female lawyers consider working part-time as a barrier to becoming a law firm partner, only 39 per cent of men believed this. The research also revealed massive discrepancies in views on whether motherhood represents a barrier to becoming a partner. Only 10 per cent of male respondents said it was, against 52 per cent of women. However, fewer women (45.3 per cent) than men (60.9 per cent) had aspirations to become a partner.
One female respondent to McKerrell’s research said: “As soon as there is a risk of women ‘settling down’ and possibly having children, they are far less likely to be seen as a serious option for partnership. They are not seen as committed.”
Another female lawyer in her twenties said: “My view is that motherhood is frowned upon in Scotland’s commercial law firms.” Another in her thirties said: “There is still systemic discrimination against women in the legal profession. Those of us who do succeed pay a very heavy price in sacrificing our home and family life to put in long hours . . . We’e expected to be grateful when we reach senior positions and not to rock the boat, not to demand too much.”
The male partners in law firms universally deny that any covert discrimination is going on. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they are adamant they promote solely on the basis of merit and irrespective of gender.
McKerrell says: “There is no explicit discrimination, unlike 20 years ago, for example that a woman could not have kids and become a partner. But some implicit discrimination seems to remain.”
No more so than when it comes to pay. Pay differentials between men and women are significant. McKerrell’s research revealed that six to 10 years after admission there is a pay gap of £14,000 between male and female lawyers, and that this had risen to £23,000 at 11-15 years after admission, and £42,000 at 16-20 years.
Stevenson, at the Law Society, said: “Yes, a big pay gap was identified by the research but you have to remember that billable hours are a big determinant of salary. The law is not state-funded, unlike other professions such as teaching and doctors.”
This article was published in the Herald on 29 January 2007