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Interesting and thoughtful post, Anon 10.29. I think this raises two issues. First, I lived and worked in a small, 14,000, market town. I saw most of my employees at the week-end shopping, in the pub, playing sport and so on. I went skiing every year with the husband of one of my secretaries.I could no more have made one of them redundant than, well, ski competently. They all knew my children, one babysat (is that really a verb?) them for a number of years. Freshfields do not seem troubled by such issues. Why should they be? Their partners will never see their now 'redundant' employees again.

Secondly, my guess is that the majority of Freshfields' clients are large corporations, local authorities, NHS trusts and the like. They all have one feature in common. Those actually instructing them do not earn the money they are spending on them. Almost all of my clients were spending their own, hard earned money. There is a massive difference between the two types of client.

Finally, yes I know I said two, who is going to take up the files part finished by the 'redundant'? I assume it will be the employees who are not made redundant so instead of 60 hours a week they can look forward to 70-80.

May I recommend John Grisham's "Grey Mountain"? It should be compulsory reading for al lawyers.