Our work is underpinned by a regulatory objective to encourage an independent, strong, diverse and effective legal profession. We share this regulatory objective with the organisations that we oversee and consider how best to promote it in all our work.
Our 10-year sector-wide strategy to reshape legal services to meet society’s needs included the challenge to dismantle barriers to a diverse and inclusive profession at all levels.
Our State of Legal Services 2020 report concluded that progress in improving diversity and inclusion in the legal services sector has been too slow – in particular, the pace of progress in closing attainment gaps at senior levels of the profession.
Everyone across the sector needs to work together to ensure that the profession reflects the diversity of the communities it serves, at all levels.
As part of our business plan consultation 2022/22, we have set out our proposals to advance our work on equality, diversity and inclusion to remove barriers to a diverse and inclusive profession. For 2023 we plan to:
- Understand the impact of regulators’ existing EDI interventions to identify remaining challenges and examples of best practice
- Consult on a statement of policy on EDI to provide clear expectations for regulators and drive accountability
- Continue to convene and co-produce work on matters including:
- approaches to design and evaluation of interventions
- collation and use of data
- the lived experience of legal professionals.
Overseeing regulators’ progress on equality, diversity and inclusion
The regulators are required to collect and publish data on the diversity of their respective regulated communities, and critically, ensure this is embedded in all regulatory activity. We monitor this work through our regulatory performance framework. Our diversity dashboard brings together the latest diversity and inclusion information collected by the regulators.
We issued guidance (February 2017) to the regulators giving them flexibility in how they encourage diversity in the workforce, with a focus on outcomes. It encourages regulators to take their work beyond data collection. We also set out four diversity outcomes (December 2019) which require the regulators to:
- continue to gather data to ensure a clear understanding of the diversity profile of their regulated communities;
- use of data to inform development of its regulatory activities;
- collaborate with others to encourage a diverse workforce; and
- account to their stakeholders for its achievement and plans to encourage a diverse workforce.
In January 2020 we introduced three criteria to clarify what we believe good regulatory performance looks like on equality matters. Regulatory bodies should have:
- an understanding of the composition of their regulated community;
- an understanding of the barriers to entry and progression within the regulated community, and a programme of activity to mitigate those barriers with measures in place to evaluate effectiveness; and
- measures in place to understand any differential impact on protected characteristics within their disciplinary/enforcement procedures.
Addressing counter-inclusive practices in the profession
We, along with eight legal services regulators and two disciplinary tribunals have reaffirmed our commitment to ensure more inclusive workplaces for lawyers and that the profession better reflects the society and consumers it serves.
We have agreed new principles on tackling counter-inclusive misconduct through disciplinary processes (June 2022) acknowledging that while there have been some improvements in diversity and inclusion, much more work is needed.
We are currently undertaking research on experiences of barriers to getting in and getting on as a legal professional to help us consider how to foster a more welcoming and inclusive profession.
Our involvement in collaborative forums
The LSB is a member of the legal regulators’ EDI forum which brings together the active collaborative effort of the regulators to agree tangible actions. We work together on strategic priorities such as addressing barriers to entry and progression in the legal sector and developing effective and consistent approaches to evaluating EDI interventions.
The LSB is also a member of the Judicial Diversity Forum (JDF) which brings together organisations from across the legal sector to identify ways to support increased judicial diversity. The JDF provides strategic direction in the areas of challenging structural barriers to appointment, analysing and addressing the reasons behind how people’s careers progress, and the gathering and use of data and evidence. In November 2022 we published a research report for the JDF on strengthening the evaluation of JDF partners’ diversity initiatives which will inform the JDF’s priorities and actions for 2022/23.
Further information
Diversity data on each of the legal professions can be found on the relevant pages of the regulatory bodies websites.
Please see our updates and assessments of regulators’ progress:
The 2017 guidance updated earlier guidance (issued in July 2011). Please see LSB reports on regulators’ progress against the 2011 guidance:
- Diversity and the legal services regulators May 2016
- Diversity data collection and transparency March 2015
- Diversity data collection and transparency September 2013
Further reports are available on LSB’s research pages
For more information contact the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Lead Kerry Gilsenan
