Analysis: Inevitable job cuts leave society in no-win situation as it seeks to reduce expenditure

Published on Sunday 9 August 2009 19:39

ANY joy that critics of the Law Society may have gained from the news that the cost of professional membership was set to fall by a sixth may have been tempered by the accompanying announcement concerning likely job losses. Even those harshest on the society's supposed wastefulness could not have failed to be dismayed by yet more redundancies in a sector growing wearily accustomed to such depressing downsizing.

Despite incessant pressure on the society's council to reduce its expenditure, many pinned the blame for the redundancies squarely on the society's council, suggesting that the rank and file were bearing the brunt of the budgetary restraint, while the management escaped.

It will not have escaped the notice of the society that some who criticised it for profligacy are now unhappy about the steps taken to address that charge. The executive may feel they are damned if they don't and damned if they do.

Though keen to play up the budgetary benefit the round of voluntary redundancies will have on its finances, the society is maddeningly vague on the details of this job-loss programme.

Unwilling to confirm how many positions it is looking to shed, it is also fuzzy on whether the redundancies will become compulsory in the event of a poor uptake.

Given the reduction target is 250,000, it would be surprising if enforced job cuts did not materialise should that figure not be reached. This will be especially true if other efficiency savings, outlined in draft in the figures, are found to be unachievable. Commenting on such a moveable feast is near impossible until actual proposals are made.

As the society prepares to sell the 100 certificate cut and accompanying budget hole to the profession at a special general meeting in Glasgow next month, it would be forgiven for allowing itself some degree of relief with the news that its English counterpart recently announced a 19 per cent increase in its own membership fees. That increase brought the cost of practising as a solicitor in England and Wales to 1,180, more than double the level levied in Scotland.

One vociferous critic of the Society's management was dismissive of the comparison. "The fact that somebody else is even less efficient, and provides even less good value for money, isn't an excuse," the critic said. "The fact that people are doing things differently is largely irrelevant."

Nonetheless, the realisation that practising as a lawyer in Scotland costs half the figure borne by English solicitors should help the society immeasurably as it seeks to pass its revised budget.

Although unwilling to comment specifically on the near 20 per cent hike in membership fees foisted upon the English profession, vice-president Ian Smart will be aware of the political assistance the decision has offered his organisation.

His case may also be helped by the commitment to transparency shown by the organisation during this debate.

Perhaps aware of the general sceptical mood in the country, or perhaps because it felt it had no choice, there is no doubt that the society has made efforts to engage with its members as it decides the best way forward.

Whether or not this is enough to pass the revised budget remains to be seen.

Questions remain to be answered on some of the details of the cost-cutting, and one suspects that the society will have to bring forward concrete proposals for a cut in council and committee convener remuneration for suspicions over its commitment to sharing some of the pain of its members to evaporate.