Government spend on law firms "reduced by 10% last year" to £196.4m: research
The amount of money spent by the UK Government on law firms and barristers fell 10% last year (year-end 31st March) to £196.4m, down from £217.2m the previous year and £238.4m in 2016/17, according to analysis carried out by Thomson Reuters.
The company, which looked at the spending by 37 out of 47 departments, said: “The fall in spending on external legal advice comes as part of continued efforts by the Government to manage legal services more efficiently.
“As part of these efforts, the Government has been improving the in-house legal services available to departments with the aim of reducing the need for them to instruct external law firms.”
More than 1,000 lawyers from 24 departments had now been consolidated into the Government Legal Department (GLD), it pointed out. “This concentration of expertise from different backgrounds in one place increases the chance that the needs of departments can be more easily met internally.”
Thomson Reuters suggested that the expertise of external firms was still important when dealing with especially complex legal issues or to supplement GLD resources during busy periods, however. “For example, depending on the final deal agreed, the process of exiting the European Union may cause an uptick in spending on external legal advice in particular areas.”
It added that Brexit raised a number of major legal challenges, “such as deciding which EU laws to keep or amend – or the alternative possibility of implementing new ones to consider – which the GLD may not be able to handle at current capacity”.
Desmond Brady, director of Public Sector, Academic and Bar at Thomson Reuters, said: “The focus on developing its in-house legal services has enabled the Government to successfully manage down its spending on external law firms and barristers.
“However, external legal advisers continue to add value when required. At any one time, the Government is involved in a wide range of legal engagements and this isn’t going to change, which maintains the need for external advisers.”
Brady added: “The huge additional workload that Brexit represents will likely test the resilience of the Government Legal Department’s consolidated model – it will, no doubt, be running at full capacity.
“The legal profession expects Brexit will result in an increase in work for external law firms. We’d expect to see the same picture for government lawyers.
“Depending on the outcome of Brexit negotiations, many areas of UK legislation may be re-evaluated in the coming months, including product standards, immigration and agriculture to name just a few.”
The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the Department for International Trade (DfIT) were in the top five departments in terms of spending on external law firms and barristers last year.
The SFO spent £11.8m last year, up from £9.8m in 2016/17, positioning it third behind the Crown Prosecution Service and Department for Transport. DfIT was fifth with a spend of £5.2m last year, up from £579,000 the year before.