Women and ethnic minority solicitors are challenging the traditional bastions of the profession.

Neil Rose pores over the fine print of the Law Society's annual statistical report

Ten years is a long time in the legal profession.

In 1992, there were 72,449 solicitors on the roll, of whom 59,563 were practising.

A decade later, the figures had leapt to 113,372 and 89,045, increases of 56% and 49% respectively.

The figures, revealed in the Law Society's Annual Statistical Report for the year ended 31 July 2002, also show that women accounted for much of this rise.

From 15,666 practising women solicitors in 1992 (26.3% of all practising solicitors), the figure is now 34,366 (38.6%), and if the comparative rates of growth continue, women will easily be in the majority in the profession in another decade.

And there is every sign that this growth will continue - some 63.4% of those doing law degrees are now women, an ever-growing statistic.

But in some ways, little has changed from 1992 - in fact, in relation to their status in the profession, women are actually doing a little worse.

It is accepted wisdom that women perennially lag behind men in terms of being elevated to partnerships, and the figures amply back this up.

In 1992, of solicitors with ten to 19 years' experience - the band within which most partners and sole practitioners fall - 79% of men were partners and only 53% of women.

Last year, men reached 82.3%, while women were at 54.7%.

The figures take no account of whether women solicitors have taken career breaks.

However, the report offers the 'participation rates' of the two sexes - that is, the percentage of men and women on the roll who also had practising certificates.

In every five-year age band, a higher percentage of male solicitors were practising.

The most marked difference was for solicitors between 36 and 50, where around 85% of male solicitors on the roll had practising certificates, compared to around 71% of women.

There were more practising women than men aged 30 or less, but the majority of those in the older age groups were men.

Almost 56% of practising solicitors were aged 40 or younger.

The report found the average age of the practising woman solicitor to be 36.6, compared to 43 for men.

Unsurprisingly, given the growth in the profession over recent years, nearly 55% of solicitors were qualified for ten years or less.

The report also highlighted a growing disparity between the salaries for male and female trainee solicitors nationally.

On average across England and Wales, male trainees were paid 20,068, 7% more than women on 18,749 - and the gap grew over the past year.

Greater London, Yorkshire and Humberside and the north-east were the worst areas for this.

Overall, 20% of trainees were paid at or below the compulsory minimum salary.

Trainees in central London were, unsurprisingly, the best paid, at an average of 26,047, while those in Wales were the worst at 13,341.

After a dip in 2000/01, the highest-ever number of training contracts were registered in 2001/02 - 5,385, of which a record 60% went to women.

The growth in the number of women solicitors is replicated by ethnic minority solicitors.

Whereas a decade ago, just 2% of solicitors were from ethnic minorities, they are estimated to make up 7% of practising solicitors and 8.1% of those on the roll - 7.9% of the UK's population is from an ethnic minority.

Most ethnic minority solicitors have a high participation rate.

However, like women, solicitors from ethnic minorities are also suffering when it comes to status within law firms.

Whereas 43% of white Europeans were partners, only 24% of ethnic minority solicitors were.

'This is partly a reflection of the fact that solicitors from the ethnic minorities have only recently been entering the profession in numbers,' the report said.

'It is interesting to note, though, that 8.2% of ethnic minority solicitors are sole practitioners, compared with only 5.4% for all white European solicitors in private practice.'

Some 22.3% of legal practice course students were from ethnic minorities, compared to 14% a decade ago, as were 16.4% of newly qualifieds, compared to 9% in 1992.

Of those ethnic minority newly qualifieds last year who disclosed their ethnicity, 53% were Asian, 12% African, 10% Chinese and 7% Afro-Caribbean.

Almost 58% of ethnic minority newly qualifieds were women, higher than the overall figure for all newly qualifieds of 55.6%; more than three-quarters of newly qualified Afro-Caribbean lawyers were women.

In total, there were 6,646 newly qualifieds in 2002, of whom 73% qualified directly through the traditional LPC route, while 22% transferred either from abroad or other legal professions, with the rest unknown.

The percentage of students with law degrees continues to fall sharply.

It is now 72%, compared to 87% a decade ago.

Of the 1,457 transfers into the profession, there were 1,042 foreign lawyers, of whom 451 came from Australia and New Zealand.

The US and Canada (106), Hong Kong (102) and Singapore/Malaysia (90) were the next main sources of transfer-ring lawyers.

Some 252 barristers requalified as solicitors, as did 130 legal executives and 33 justices' clerks.

The average age of a newly qualified last year was 29.6, with the average age for men slightly older than that for women.

Almost half were aged 27 or younger, and two-thirds 29 or younger.

Five managed to qualify while aged just 23, while only 69 people aged 50 or older were admitted.

All these newly qualifieds worked at some of the 14,927 different organisations around the world which employed solicitors.

There were 9,231 private practice partnerships and sole principal firms, located in 12,834 separate offices in England and Wales.

This represented a 9% drop in firms and 8% drop in offices over the past five years.

London had a disproportionately large share of law firms - 26% - considering that 13.5% of England and Wales' population lives there.

The report said: 'This value is distorted by the presence in London of a large number of firms serving predominantly commercial clients.

Outside the south-east (including London), there is reasonable correspondence between the proportion of law firms and the population they serve.'

For example, 9.9% of firms were in the eastern region, serving 10.2% of the population.

However, the West and especially East Midlands looked a bit short of firms on this basis, as did the north-east, and Yorkshire and Humberside.

The vast majority of law firms were quite small - more than five-sixths had four partners or fewer.

At the other end of the spectrum, only 1.7% of all firms - 155 in total - had 26 or more partners, almost half of which were headquartered in London.

There were 4,131 sole practitioners last year, 3,646 firms of two to four partners, 931 firms of five to ten partners, and 367 firms of 11 to 25 partners.

The concentration of firms in London was even sharper when it came to the number of solicitors working in the capital.

Some 42% were employed by London firms, meaning there was one solicitor for every 240 Londoners, compared to an average of 1:750 for England and Wales as a whole.

Excluding London, this figure increased to 1:1,140.

This density was lowest in the north-east, where there was one practitioner per 1,465 people.

The statistics have long shown in-house roles to be more popular with women.

While 36.5% of those in private practice were women, the figure jumped to 43% of those in commerce and industry, 50% of those in the Crown Prosecution Service, 54% of those in local government, 62% of those in advice services, and 70% of those in the National Health Service.

Overall, in-house has become more popular over the past decade.

Some 16.4% worked outside private practice in 1992; last year, it reached 20.7%.

Most of these trends have been in evidence for some years and show no sign of stopping.

The perception may be of a profession dominated by white men; the reality is fast becoming very different.