Women in Law Pledge
Exchange Chambers are proud signatories of the Women in Law Pledge, created by the Bar Council of England and Wales, The Law Society, and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx) to help tackle the issue of gender equality within the legal profession.
In signing the Pledge, Chambers has committed to implementing an action plan addressing key areas of the business including recruitment, career progression and retention, opportunities and pay, training, marketing and management.
Chambers has re-stated its commitment to the Pledge, with an updated action plan being approved for implementation from March 2026.
Our key targets include the following:
– Maintaining our current gender balance in pupillage & external recruitment and achieving gender balance in recruitment across all departments.
– Supporting female practitioner’s career progression by:
- identifying, mentoring and assisting potential silk and / or judicial applicants;
- achieve participation of juniors in led cases in proportion to the departmental gender balance by monitoring instructions to juniors in led cases;
- ensure retention of female barristers; and
- ensuring the availability of flexible working opportunities by maintaining and annually reviewing Chambers’ flexible working policy.
– Ensuring equal pay and access to opportunities by monitoring receipts and work allocation across chambers by reference to gender, seniority and department.
– Preventing sex discrimination, bullying, and sexual harassment in the workplace by:
- ensuring that all members of chambers and staff to have received ED&I and anti-bullying and harassment training within the last 3 years;
- ensuring policies are applied, enforced and appropriate disciplinary action taken where breaches occur; and
- implementing insofar as possible within Chambers, the recommendations made by the Independent Review into Bullying, Harassment and Sexual Harassment at the Bar
– Achieving gender balance in Chambers’ management, by maintaining a balanced membership of Chambers Management Board, and all committees, and seeking to achieve gender balance in the senior management team.
– Ensuring participation in seminars and marketing events reflects chambers’ gender balance for each department.
Chambers’ EDI Committee has formed a Working Group which will be tracking our progress towards achieving our goals.
Chambers is committed to supporting the progression of women in the profession by focussing on retention and practice development opportunities. We are confident that in working to achieve our targets, we can make a real positive change within Chambers.
