Six London boroughs have joined together to slash almost £1.5m a year in legal fees.

The London Boroughs Legal Alliance (LBLA), which links lawyers from Harrow, Hammersmith & Fulham, Camden, Hillingdon, Hounslow and Kensington & Chelsea borough councils, aims to save £1.44m a year by using fewer private law firms, locums and barristers.

The LBLA will share a new panel of just 16 law firms, far fewer than the combined total of firms used by the six councils previously. The panel is understood to include national firm Weightmans and south-west firms Ashfords and TLT. London firm Moon Beever will give specialist advice on debt recovery and insolvency and north-east firm Dickinson Dees will advise on pensions, private finance initiatives and public private partnerships.

Hugh Peart, Harrow Council’s director of legal and governance services, said local authorities needed the best advice available, but also had a duty to get best value for council taxpayers. ‘I am confident the LBLA will do just that.’

Guy Goodman, chairman of the Solicitors in Local Government group, said: ‘Procuring external providers intelligently is good practice. It reduces external spend and frees up funds to strengthen in-house teams.’

The six councils will also collaborate over the procurement of ancillary legal services, such as online knowledge and case management systems, and reduce training costs by sharing resources and budgets.