News - News - Race Equality Award Winners

The second Solicitor's Race Equality Award winners were announced last night at the Law Society, 113 Chancery Lane in London.  The event is jointly held by the Law Society and the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE). 

The compère for the evening was the broadcaster John Pinner. Fiona Woolf, the President of the Law Society, spoke about the significant increase of ethnic minority entrants into the profession and the importance of celebrating success and rewarding solicitors who are outstanding and promote equality and diversity. 

Also speaking at the event was Trevor Phillips, the outgoing Chair of the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE), who has been appointed as the Chair of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights (CEHR). He said that the solicitor arm of the legal profession offers the possibility of social mobility to those at the bottom of the social ladder. Whilst he acknowledged that many firms are embracing the advantages of diversity, many ethnic minorities, he said, still face difficulties. That progression remain a problem and the Carter Review will have an impact on ethnic minority lawyers. He is in favour of the services offered to clients being better but not at the detriment of some sections of the society. 

The Lord Chancellor, Lord Falconer, presented the awards and paid tribute to Trevor Phillips and Janet Paraskeva (former Chief Executive of the Law Society) who jointly came up with the idea of the event. Lord Falconer was of the view however, that to make dreams come true, there must be role models and role models must start from having judges who are representative of society and he cited examples, including the appointment of Mrs Justice Dobbs as the first ethnic minority High Court judge.

The winners last night were:

Best employer, small and medium-sized – that is firms of 25 partners or fewer, and the not-for-profit organisations

• Paragon Law

Fisher Meredith was highly commended in this category.

Best employer, large firms – that is firms with more than 25 partners.

• Wragge & Co

Best race equality initiative, small and medium-sized firms – that is firms of 25 partners or fewer, and not-for-profit organisations.

• Coventry Law Centre

Best race equality initiative, large firms - that is firms with more than 25 partners.

• Lovells

Wragge & Co was highly commended in this category.

• Judges' award for outstanding contribution to race equality.

• Two awards were made in this category to the Black Solicitors' Network (BSN) and Barclays.