Letter from London: Where Magic Happens
Ed. note: The legal world is much bigger than New York, or Washington, or even the United States. Welcome to Letter from London, a weekly dispatch from the other side of the pond. Our U.K. correspondent, Isaac Smith, will expose ATL readers to the latest goings-on in the London legal world. You can reach Isaac by email, at isaacsmithlondon@googlemail.com.
The G20 summit, accompanied by its anti-capitalist sideshow, arrives in London this week - and UK Big Law is feeling a little scared.
Law firms are warning employees not to wear suits on Wednesday or Thursday so as to avoid being targeted in the violent protests planned around London’s financial district.
Which provokes an interesting question: how ghetto does a corporate lawyer need to dress in order to avoid arousing suspicion as to their true identity?
We’ll soon find out.
It all seems a bit unfair, really. It’s not as if lawyers got the super big bonuses. And now their salaries are actually falling. If those nasty anti-capitalists had bothered to have a quick scan of The Lawyer last Wednesday, they’d have seen that Shearman & Sterling’s London office had followed Freshfields in cutting newly qualified associate salaries by 8%.
Are we going back in time? More after the jump.
Getting back to where we once belonged
The pay cuts are one of a number of factors contributing to an increasing sense that this country is going back in time. With house prices down by as much as 60% in some areas, unemployment at levels not seen for over a decade and the IRA even making a comeback, we’re wondering what comes next.
A relaxation of the law against selling fireworks to children? A return to the widespread use of asbestos? A re-introduction of smoking on British Airways flights?
Speaking of British Airways flights, if you take one from London to a South American/South East Asian capital city in the next few months, it’s likely you’ll find yourself sitting next to one of the many UK law graduates who’ve had their training contract start dates put back. Be nice to them, they didn’t get paid as much to defer as you. Clifford Chance, which announced its voluntary deferral scheme on Thursday, is the UK’s highest payer with £11,000. In contrast, Weil is giving US recruits up to US$75,000 (£51,623) to hold off for a year.
This deferral thing has been happening in London for a while now, but the fact that a ‘magic circle’ firm did it has made everyone sit up and pay attention. As you may have noticed, we have a bit of a weakness for that ‘magic circle’ term over here - with even the hardest-nosed of British businessmen going weak when they hear it, overcome by images of kindly wizards and story telling bears.
So where the hell did this phrase come from?
According to one poster on a recent legalweek.com article on the subject (scroll down - 10th post), it was coined by reptiles. Others suggest that journalists were responsible.
As a nation, you’re clearly less susceptible to such branding - as evidenced by the David Beckham-like failure of any of our magical firms to truly make it big in the US. And with Clifford Chance cutting 24 associates from its New York office in redundancy round number two last week, it doesn’t look like that’s about to change anytime soon.
A couple more things
Since the recession started, Australian and New Zealand lawyers have been among the first to get the chop at several London firms - so Aussies and Kiwis at Freshfields will be shifting nervously in their seats after the firm sent them an email outlining the procedure they have to follow to stay in the UK if they lose their jobs. Freshfields, which still hasn’t made any official redundancies, insists that it has no plans to cut staff.
On a slightly different note, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is in talks with Buckingham Palace over changing the law to allow Catholics to inherit the throne.
Elsewhere on our green and pleasant island…
Newcastle is a city in the north east of England whose residents are known as ‘Geordies’ and speak in accents so strong that people from elsewhere in the UK struggle to understand them. Sting is an example of a Geordie who has successfully toned down his accent in order to achieve wider success.
On Tuesday, Newcastle-based law firm Watson Burton launched a redundancy programme which could claim 75 employees, including partners, associates and support staff - that’s 25% of its total headcount.
What have we learned?
Salaries can go down as well as up - and the past, my friends, remains firmly with us.
Quote of the week
A promotional announcement from the guys over at G20 Meltdown: “At 12 noon, April 1st, we’re going to reclaim the City, thrusting into the very belly of the beast: the Bank of England.”
Find out how many lawyers were eaten alive by hate-filled mobs next week.
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FIRST!
Ugh, smelly kumbayah anti-globalization vegan wingnut throwbacks to Woodstock partying like it's Seattle, 1999 all over again...
Again, I think that TX and NY can agree that we are all better than Eurotrash.
This post needs to be 19 paragraphs shorter.
How "ghetto" does a corporate lawyer have to dress? are you serious? I'm an avid reader, infrequently comment, and on occassion have sent in tips that have ended up being stories.... and i am completely shocked at the way this was written?
What exactly are you implying by using the term "ghetto" and have no idea concept of how problematic that term can be?
Wow, this confirms to some extent the fact that people in our profession are living in a bubble. A point that will probably be confirmed by the responses to this comment.
Rambling, dull, largely uninformative. Please get rid of this feature, or at least hire someone to write it who can make it mildly interesting.
Rather than not wearing suits and hiding, biglaw has to answer the charge that they helped destroy the world by overwhelming the watchmen with brilliant and highly compensated legal talent.
Perhaps working with the administration to figure out how to keep this from happening again would be a great step.
Maybe we could schedule the next G20 meeting in Texas. Damn hippies won't show up to protest there.
4, I bet you're a lot of fun at cocktail parties. Do you get off to feigning outrage on message boards? Take the Malcolm X doll out of your ass.
5, right on
6's mom
8- let me guess.. northeastern or midwestern, affluent upbringing, caucasian, self-professed colorblind moderate?
If I had sex with a platypus this weekend, does that make me British?
WOW - it gets worse. I didn't think it was possible to beat last week's tawdry effort.
Badly written, patronising and most importantly shite.
These "protestors" are ideological fanatics who plan to use fear and violence to force society to change. Now if there were a word for a person like that, what would it be? Ah yes - terrorist. And these individuals should be dealt with accordingly.
12 - You're an idiot.
13: 12 here. What exactly are you disputing - that people who use fear and violence to achieve social change that they can't achieve through peaceful means are terrorist, or that that's what these people are planning to do?
Or do I give you too much credit in assuming that you were making an actual point?
http://i42.tinypic.com/34o25ud.jpg
12/14 - 'These people' - however ridiculous or fruitless their cause have a right to voice their concerns. The minority are going for a fight but it is the media who are stoking this fire of fear by only reporting the one or two who are violent.
They are not 'terrorists' and should not be treated as such.
You're an idiot for believing everything you read.
First, it's hardly a novel concept that the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter is which side of the issue you're on.
Second, the key difference with the American revolution would be the (lack of) use of terror. People seem to forget that the real goal of terrorism, in the most literal sense of the word, is to use fear to enact change. There may have been some intimidation or torries during the revolution, but the revolutionaries were not using fear as an agent of change.
17: terrorists intentionally target non-combatants - freedom fighters do not
16: 12 again. Of course I'm only talking about those who plan to use intimidation and violence, however large or small that number may be. I assumed that would be taken as a given. I fully support non violent speech, protest, and debate whether or not I agree with the substance of the message.
18: yes, but who gets to define "combatant?"
Snore...y'all a bunch of git-faced wankers. Bring on the scones!
Whatever you think of the protesters, a bunch of lawyers did in fact get a lot of money (partners way more, but associates profited handsomely, too) for creating the instruments that led to our current demise. And an 8% pay cut from $160,000 or so doesn't really count as hardship.
12 ??
How could a Catholic serve as head of the C of E?
This is a monstrous and backwards gesture spurred by unreflective, left-wing relativism.
this uk drivel is idiotic. if i wanted to read asinine blogging by the pasties from across the pond (which i don't), i'd go to roll on friday.
also, they're not telling you to avoid wearing suits because they're afraid that people are targeting lawyers. they're telling you to avoid suits so people don't confuse you for bankers.