3 Hare Court is a proud signatory to the Women in Law Pledge created by the Bar Council of England and Wales, The Law Society, and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx). We are committed to the progress of equality and elimination of sex discrimination and pledge to make positive change for the legal profession
What is the Women in Law Pledge?
The Women in Law Pledge is a collaboration between The Bar Council, The Law Society and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx), which was launched on 30 June 2019 to tackle the issue of gender equality, eliminate bias based on sex within the legal profession and build a more equal profession for all.
Why is it needed?
The Pledge was launched in 2019 to mark the centenary of the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act, which enabled women to become solicitors, barristers, jurors and magistrates for the first time. Yet, 100 years on, although women join the Bar in similar numbers to men, this is not seen in respect of women remaining in the profession, or in reaching senior positions.
The Bar Council’s most recent report on Diversity at the Bar 2020 shows that 45.8% of pupils are female (the same percentage as male). But for non-QCs this drops to 40.7% (against a male increase to 58.4%), and to only 16.8% of QCs (against 82.7% of QCs being male).
Why has 3 Hare Court Chambers signed up to the Pledge?
We have chosen to sign up to the Pledge in recognition of the difficulties and barriers women face in their career progression, across the profession as a whole and including within Chambers. By signing up to the Pledge and making public our targets, we are holding ourselves accountable to taking action to improve gender equality in our workplace, and creating an environment in which women are able to successfully progress their careers and to be involved in decision-making at all levels within our Chambers.
What have we committed to?
We pledge to promote gender equality in the workplace through the measures set out in our Action Plan. These include:
- Achieving parity of retention rates between female and male members of Chambers by ensuring equal access to and fair allocation of work, availability of flexible working and support;
- Having a named member of our senior leadership team/management committee who is accountable for gender diversity and inclusion and who will report to the Equality & Diversity Committee on the progress towards gender equality targets on a 6 monthly basis;
- Having at least one female member on all committees within Chambers, including the Management Committee, and any other ad hoc or standing committees established from time to time;
- Monitoring equal access to and fair allocation of work and ensuring a fair and equitable distribution of unassigned work (including led and leading work) between female and male members of Chambers;
- Investigating whether there is a gender pay gap between female and male members of Chambers;
- Conducting annual reviews of marketing expenditure per member to ensure equality aims are being achieved through marketing support.
In addition to our commitments set out in our Pledge, we have also implemented robust and effective policies on Parental Leave, Flexible Working, Anti-Harassment and Equal Access to and Fair Allocation of Work in order to achieve our goals of improving gender equality and female retention within Chambers.
We recognise that gender diversity is far from the only diversity issue faced by the Bar, and we will strive to apply the commitments set out above to all of the protected characteristics.
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