Paralegals phone for help

SURVEY: stress and bullying complaints fall but concern remains, says Trainees Solicitors Group

Paralegals are increasingly being used as cheap labour by law firms and suffering exclusion from Law Society regulation, while bullying and stress remain problems within the workplace, according to recent figures.

A breakdown of the 629 calls made to the Trainee Solicitors Group (TSG) helpline between November 2001 and May 2002 showed 28% were from paralegals - compared with only 14% for the previous period between April and October 2001 - mostly complaining of firms going back on promises to offer training contracts after a probationary period.

The rise in these calls meant complaints of bullying and stress fell by comparison, although two recent surveys highlighted their continued presence in the workplace.

Verity Chase, the TSG chairwoman, said: 'The nature of the calls we receive is changing, as most used to concern bullying at work, a lack of supervision or stress.

However, a significant bulk of the calls now are from disgruntled paralegals, who are doing the work of a fully-qualified lawyer, but being paid a minimal wage because they fall outside the training regulations.'

She continued: 'We would like to see regulation brought in by the Law Society so firms have to make it clear when offering paralegal positions they do not give the employee the false impression a training contract will automatically follow.

The setting of a minimum wage level for paralegals and the role they should play would also be welcome.'

In response, a Law Society spokesman said: 'We have sympathy with the predicament some paralegals find themselves in [but] if we attempted to influence the relationship between paralegals and law firms, the firms who wanted to escape such influence could describe paralegals in other ways such as secretaries and legal assistants.

We are currently reviewing the whole spectrum of legal education in the context of our training framework review.'

Ms Chase said the fall in bullying and stress in law firms was partly down to the Law Society's introduction of a monitoring team over the past few years, although she added: 'there is still a long way to go'.

This opinion is backed up by a recent survey of 2000 health and safety representatives by private sector union Amicus.

It found that more than half of the respondents said stress was a bigger problem than it was five years ago and a similar number said it had got worse in the past 12 months.

Also, a survey by stress experts Work Stress management revealed that 82% of the 5000 UK employers questioned described themselves as being at risk from being sued by employees for causing workplace stress or bullying.

Andrew Towler