Women in Law Pledge

The Women in Law Pledge is a joint initiative by the Bar Council, Law Society and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx) to help tackle the issue of gender equality in the legal profession.

4 Stone Buildings: Targets and Action Plan

Chambers intends to meet the following targets:

  1. Target 1:  to continue monitoring allocation of work opportunities and working to principles of fair allocation and to monitor income to ensure fair distribution of work.
  2. Target 2:  to continue to support women to ensure parity of retention rates between women and men in Chambers, including by ensuring the ED&I Code continues to include effective parental leave and flexible working policies, and by ensuring the continuation of supportive relationships in Chambers.
  3. Target 3:   to develop and maintain the mentoring schemes in Chambers to ensure support is provided to women members in their applications for silk, judicial position or other appointments, including panel appointments, and to continue to promote the use of practice development meetings.
  4. Target 4:  to continue to increase the number and proportion of women members of Chambers.  As at August 2022, 22.5% of the members of Chambers are women (9 out of 40 members).  Of the 10 most junior members of Chambers, 40% are women.
  5. Target 5:  to increase the number of women clerks in Chambers. As at August 2022, Chambers has no women clerks (out of 6 clerks).
  6. Target 6:  to continue participation by women in marketing and speaking opportunities and to continue to ensure that marketing activities offered by Chambers take into consideration location and timing to ensure the continued participation of women barristers and women professional clients.
  7. Target 7:  to ensure that women are properly represented on all committees in Chambers. As at August 2022 the total proportion of women on all of Chambers’ committees is 32.6%. While women are well represented on most of Chambers’ committees, the proportion of women for some committees is less than the proportion of women members in Chambers.
  8. Target 8:  to review and maintain a policy for menopause included in the ED&I Code, to ensure support and adjustments for women in Chambers in the period before, during and after the menopause.

Nicola Timmins and Emma Horner are the members of Chambers accountable for gender diversity and inclusion. Chambers’ ED&I Committee will be monitoring the targets and will report to the Bar Council annually

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