The 2,000-strong Government Legal Service is facing job cuts of 20% to 40%, as government savings targets translate directly into headcount reductions, the Gazette has learned.

The news comes as the Attorney General’s Office confirmed that government departments will also be seeking to ‘look critically’ at their external legal spend.

The Ministry of Justice; Department of Health; Department for Business Innovation and Skills; Department for Culture, Media & Sport; and Department for Work and Pensions are all looking at slashing their legal teams by 25% to 30%, according to informed Gazette sources.

Across the board, cuts are understood to range from 20% to 40%. The Gazette reported last week that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is seeking to cut 40% of lawyers, amounting to 42 posts.

The Gazette has been told that senior posts will be among the first to disappear, and a department-by-department review of other posts will be required to identify 20%-40% of savings, in line with the targets outlined in the government’s spending review.

Cuts at the MoJ will also follow court closures. Public services union Prospect has predicted that a number of the MoJ’s 115 GLS lawyers will be among the 685 posts it expects the department to lose overall, as the MoJ finds required savings of £325m.

The Gazette has also been told that senior lawyers charged with finding savings are frustrated at being told that they cannot ‘spend to save’, for example by purchasing software that could improve case management or be used to control their spending on outside lawyers.

Prospect has warned that many departments are not conducting skills audits as part of their departmental reviews. The Gazette understands that this may lead to a failure by departments to identify what is likely to be an increase in demand for lawyers within government.

At the Office of the Attorney General, who is notional head of the GLS, a spokeswoman said departments were looking closely at their costs, including the amount spent on law firms.

She added: ‘GLS lawyers are employed by the departments in which they work and it is for individual departments to decide on the size and structure of their legal team. All departments are looking at the costs of their various functions in the context of the current Spending Review, including looking critically at their external legal spend.’