Bigger is not better, writes Sundeep Bhatia

Sundeep Bhatia, solicitor advocate and owner of Beaumonde Law Practice, has started a new blog about diversity over at Solicitors Journal. Read the full article via the link at the bottom of this page.

We are described as black Asian minority ethnic lawyers. Many of us have set up small new firms to avoid the glass ceiling phenomenon. We are twice as likely to be sole practitioners as our non-BAME counterparts and we are far more likely to practice within firms of five partners or less.

The firms we run are successful and have so far weathered the storms of all the reforms and regulatory obstacles that you have thrown at us over the last decade or more. They are not charity cases. They do not require special treatment. All we ask for is a level playing field. Yet for the last six years you have done your best to put us out of business.

Your whole strategy is dependent on driving small firms from the market because of some misguided idea, on your part, that bigger is better and more efficient.

I know better. A few years ago I saw the accounts of a major criminal legal aid firm.

The amount of debt in its annual accounts made my eyes water. That was certainly a firm that required austerity measures to decrease its spending deficit!

The above was used by kind permission from Solicitors Journal, read the full article.