Wragges top employer

Birmingham-based Wragge & Co has held its position as the best law firm in the country to work for, according to a survey funded by the Department for Trade and Industry (DTI).

Wragges was placed at 19th in the survey of the 100 best employers, published by The Sunday Times, followed by City firm DLA (31), Simmons & Simmons (48), Osborne Clarke (56), Eversheds (92) and CMS Cameron McKenna (93).

The survey was launched last year, when Wragges was placed 14th out of 50.

Wragges was also rated ninth in the 'Proud to work here' list, with 96.5% of employees happy to tell people where they work.

Osborne Clarke rated seventh in the top ten of most trusting managers, with 95% of employees maintaining that management trusted staff to do a good job.

Osborne Clarke had the lowest staff turnover of the six firms (12%), and Eversheds the highest (23%).

Wragges had the highest proportion of women (69%), while at Camerons, 67% of staff are women, but just 15% are partners.

It also found that just 4% of staff at Eversheds are from ethnic minorities, with only one non-white partner.

John Crabtree, Wragges' senior partner, said: 'It's a credit to the legal services sector that so many law firms appear on the list.'

Some 1,300 companies with more than 250 employees were invited to apply to be on the list; 249 responded.

Each company distributed a questionnaire to a randomly selected group of 250 workers at all levels.

Supermarket chain Asda was top followed by Microsoft.

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Victoria MacCallum