The long-hours culture made national headlines this summer, with The Times reporting that a new generation of young solicitors was refusing to sell their lives to the City and lose their health to get rich quick.

In the newspaper, Dr Elizabeth Fischl described how a solicitor patient had been referred to her with a note saying that he took a lot of sickness absence.

On examination, it emerged that he had worked on a big merger for fifteen hours a day and between six and seven days a week for 15 months.

As a result, he had taken eight days off work because of illness over five months.Young Solicitors Group committee member Nick Armstrong says: 'I'd never tell anybody that they shouldn't work those hours.

If they want to, it's their choice.

It's not for me -- and I don't find those kind of people interesting -- but they may think it's worth it for them.

I just wonder whether it's true that this is really what they want.

It's all tied in to your expectations.

If you go to the right university, you expect to make a certain amount of money.

As your social group gets narrower, you get trapped into a certain lifestyle.

A lot of young solicitors are not aware of the high cost of that lifestyle.

I'm not sure it's what they would want to do if they were given an alternative.

At the moment, the cu lture of the legal working environment and the reward system is set up so that they don't have the freedom to choose something different'.Mr Armstrong, a litigator at Sheffield firm Irwin Mitchell, says that the YSG's interest in looking at the impact of stress on its peers sprung from his own desire -- and the desires of other members of the group -- to change their own working lives and explore less traditional legal careers for themselves.

'When I meet mates of mine who went off to become artists, it now takes me a couple of days before I can talk to them properly,' he says.

'You look at those kinds of divisions and wonder whether there's anything you can do about them.'The YSG is currently planning an interactive conference session in which members of the audience and a panel of specialists will dissect the dilemmas faced by a hypothetical young solicitor called Emma.

The session will follow Emma chronologically through her career, starting when she is six-months qualified and is struggling under the burden of a heavy caseload with little supervision.

Panel member Bill Knight, the senior partner of top City firm Simmons & Simmons, will give the perspective of Emma's senior partner on the stress which she is suffering.Mr Armstong speculates: 'Mr Knight may say that the firm will give Emma six months off to go surfing in Hawaii.

At that point, we'll be able to take the question into the audience and ask the young solicitors there whether they think their boss would have that reaction, and ask the older solicitors how they would cope with a stressed newly-qualified'.

Mr Armstrong recalls how one member of the YSG once made an arrangement with his firm that he would leave the office at seven o'clock every evening, that he would not push the firm on his salary if the firm didn't push him on his freedom.

'The arrangement only lasted a few days, until the next big trial,' he says.A consultant in occupational medicine will be on the panel to talk about the health risks of overworking Emma.

A psychologist will also be there, to consider the question of whether she is fundamentally unsuited to being a lawyer.

If the panel decide that she is, a legal recruitment consultant will advise on her career options, and also warn her firm about the high turnover of dissatisfied newly-qualifieds.

Neil Morgan, the director of human resources at City giant Slaughter and May, will remind the panel of the high cost of recruiting and training a solicitor.

If panel and audience decide that Emma ought to leave the law, an independent financial adviser will consider the financial rewards and structures of other professions, or, Mr Armstrong suggests, of running a beach bar in Greece.The scenario will shift to an Emma who is still in the profession but is now two-years qualified.

'Her social needs may have changed so that she's not interested in going clubbing and coping with a hangover in the office, but in leaving early to pick the kids up from school,' says Mr Armstrong.

'We'll talk about alternative systems of working.' When Emma is in a position to be offered partnership, the panel will consider what her capital contribution should be if she joins, whether the fact that she has suffered from stress early in her career is likely to be detrimental to her chances of partnership and whether, if she is made a partner, she is likely to be sympathetic to the needs of young solicitors.Partnership specialist Ronnie Fox will be on hand to discuss partnership issues.

As the senior partner of Fox Williams, Mr Fox is also keenly aware of the detrimental ef fect which stress can have on newly-qualifieds.

He says: 'I don't necessarily think people do their best if they're being kept up all night.

It comes to a point where the quality of the work suffers.

Ideally the senior lawyer working with the junior lawyer will watch out for that point and tell them to go home when it is reached.

The key to running a successful law firm is matching the resources you have with the demands that are being made of them.

In a big job, the senior solicitor's skills should include project management; this means allocating the right number of people to the job at the right level'.Mr Armstrong would like to see a change in the working culture which addresses these points.

He says: 'Is it worth £70,000 a year to keep somebody in the office seven days a week? You could have two people for £35,000 who could perform better in their work and also be emotionally stable because they are capable of holding down relationships outside it'.