Going up: entry-level solicitor jobs in Scotland are rising

Jan 22, 2016

Written By Emma Finamore, Editor, AllAboutLaw.co.uk

Good news for gender equality too: 63% of solicitors admitted in Scotland over the past five years have been women.

Scotland's solicitors' profession is booming, latest figures have revealed.

The number of training contracts has risen by 13% in the past two years, according to the Law Society of Scotland.

The Society showed that the number of entry-level positions at law firms rose by 11% in 2013, followed by a considerably more modest increase of 2% last year.

There also are signs that recruitment is slowly beginning to be spread more evenly throughout the country: 75% of traineeships are in the Central Belt' a slight drop on the previous year's 78%.

The Central (or Cultural) Belt is the part of the country that stretches from Glasgow in the west to Edinburgh in the east, and contains the majority of the population.

Officials also released figures demonstrating the feminisation of the Scottish profession: 63% of solicitors admitted over the past five years have been women.

"It's encouraging to see the number of training contracts continue to rise," Katie Wood, the society's head of admissions, said. "Particularly those on offer outside of the central belt.

“Although the number of recently qualified trainees being employed as solicitors has decreased, the prospects for aspiring solicitors remain relatively steady."

There are signs, that Scottish law firms are not retaining recruits once they have finished their two-year training regime.

The society said that 88% of trainees admitted in the last practice year were now employed as solicitors, a drop of 5% on the 2014 figure.

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