This Mental Health Awareness Week, the theme is to take action to support good mental health.
Prior to taking up office, I worked as a lecturer at the University of Law. I saw first-hand the issues facing aspiring young lawyers, the barriers they face to entering the profession and the day-to-day stresses of qualifying and entering the legal profession.
LawCare – the mental health charity for the legal sector – showed in its Impact Report 2025 that 13% of the people it supported were trainee solicitors and 4% were law students.
Its Life in the Law 2025 report also found that nearly 60% of legal professionals had low levels of mental wellbeing, 50% experienced anxiety over the last year and nearly 80% are working over their contracted time.
Legal education in the workplace
LawCare outlined several recommendations on the work the sector can do to promote better mental health and wellbeing, including legal educators equipping junior lawyers on entering the workforce and the subsequent wellbeing considerations.
Upon entering the sector, junior lawyers should have the skills and knowledge they need for a sustainable legal career.
The sector can prepare aspiring lawyers by giving them the tools to maintain their mental health and wellbeing, work in healthy ways and recognise when wider systemic issues are negatively impacting them.
Other countries have started implementing compulsory courses for law qualifications that incorporate mental health and wellbeing. This is true in Australia, with the Universities of New South Wales, Newcastle and Technology Sydney all offering Practical Legal Training courses.
The International Bar Association’s Professional Wellbeing Commission, meanwhile, launched its International Guidelines for Wellbeing in Legal Education in 2024.
The guidelines include 10 recommendations, which encourages law schools to acknowledge the importance of, and actively promote, wellbeing in legal education. It abandons the view that wellbeing issues should be seen as signs of weakness and commits to addressing systemic problems, such as competitiveness and lack of empathy.
Looking ahead
There is a road ahead in terms of implementing and imbedding these changes into learning environments.
If we start early, we can foster healthy environments for aspiring and junior lawyers.
I encourage the profession to take on the theme of Mental Health Awareness Week and take action.
The Law Society is committed to prioritising solicitor wellbeing by promoting healthy working environments, sharing best practice, and providing resources that support mental health and resilience across the profession, and is a key goal of our corporate strategy 2025-2028.
The Law Society has a Mental Health Hub which provides remote working guidance to help the profession take responsibility for our mental health and wellbeing.
We also have guidance on supporting wellbeing in the workplace, as well as a number of helplines which offer practical support to solicitors and their employees on professional and personal issues. LawCare has a helpline, support email and online chat which is open weekdays from 9am to 5pm. They can also signpost to other support agencies.
Mark Evans is president of the Law Society of England and Wales
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