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Table of Contents

• EDITOR’S RAMBLE 🗣

• FEATURED REPORT 📰

• TOGETHER WITH 1440* 🤝

• IN OTHER NEWS 🗞

• AROUND THE WEB 🌐

• STUFF THAT MIGHT HELP YOU 👌

EDITOR’S RAMBLE 🗣

You may have noticed a new byline at the end of the Featured Report recently that looked like this 👇️ 

Well, that’s me!

Amongst my friends, I’m the one who most loves a party.

Whatever it is — I’m always down.

But the best thing that’s come out of a party I’ve attended? An understanding of how to become a solicitor. 

I arrived at university to do an English Literature degree with the vague notion that I wanted to become a lawyer at the end of it… but no clue how to get there.

Luckily, I met a second year law student at a friend’s house party who had already secured a training contract and he was kind enough to spend his evening answering all my questions. 

But I don’t think it should take a chance encounter in a grotty student house with sticky floors to learn about this career path.

So, when I saw the opportunity to write for LittleLaw, I jumped on it.

When I was doing applications, I was told by graduate recruitment to read the Financial Times and The Economist to build my commercial awareness.

But, I didn’t understand much, and it made me feel like I wasn’t smart enough to become a lawyer — but now I’m a future trainee at Slaughter and May. 🎉

So I write everything for LittleLaw is as if I’m writing to first-year me.

I want to break down complex transactions, litigation, and legislation into simple terms to help you realise that being a lawyer who works on these matters is something you can achieve (because it absolutely is!).

- Laura 

P.S. LittleLaw’s looking for Campus Ambassadors (it’s a paid gig). If you’re interested, apply here — the deadline is this Sunday.

FEATURED REPORT 📰

⚖️ Next’s equal pay case (and why it matters)

What's going on here?

The Employment Tribunal (a judicial body which hears claims from dissatisfied employees) ruled that Next, the clothing and homeware shop, breached equal pay laws by paying its mostly female retail workers less than its warehouse staff, where genders are more equally split.

The decision means 3,500+ current and former Next floor staff will be eligible for a back payment of £30 million in total. Next will also have to change retail workers’ contracts so they are entitled to the same hourly pay, rest breaks, and overtime.

How did Next break the law?

In 1983, the UK introduced regulations to implement Europe’s Equal Pay Directive. This meant men and women must get equal pay if they are performing:

1. Like work (where the job is the same),

2. Work rated as equivalent (work that requires the same skills, responsibility or effort), or

3. Work of equal value (work which is different, but because of the level of skill, training, and responsibility required, is equally demanding).

Next employees argued that retail consultants were performing ‘work of equal value’ to the warehouse staff. To argue this, there was a detailed assessment of 11 different aspects of the two roles – things like physical skills, problem-solving, and decision-making – and the court agreed the work was of ‘equal value’.

78% of Next’s retail workers are female, compared to only 48% of its warehouse staff. Warehouse staff were being paid between 40 pence and £3 more per hour.

Because of this gender split, the Tribunal decided the difference in pay (of between 40 pence and £3 per hour) was a form of indirect discrimination.

What was Next’s defence?

You’re allowed to have a pay difference between two jobs of ‘equal value’ if the employer can show the difference is for a legitimate reason. This could be because the jobs are in different locations, have different levels of seniority, or just due to supply and demand in the job market.

Next argued that the pay gap was due to supply and demand – they say it’s harder to hire and keep warehouse workers, so they had to offer higher pay to attract them. But the Tribunal rejected this argument, saying it wasn't a strong enough reason to justify the indirect discrimination. They were concerned that allowing this ‘supply and demand’ defence could lead to more discriminatory pay in some sectors being justified.

Is the Tribunal’s decision right?

It’s addressing gender pay inequality – which is good, of course.

But, some people think the Tribunal’s decision doesn’t make sense.

Why? Well, when job evaluations are conducted to decide which jobs are of ‘equal value’, they ignore more specific factors (like how easy it is to find workers for each job).

For example, warehouse work can be more lonely compared to working with customers in Next stores. Also, warehouses are often in remote areas, while jobs in city-centre stores mean you can run errands or grab lunch easily. Factors like these might be why it’s harder to find warehouse workers than retail staff.

But these sorts of factors aren’t taken into consideration because they’re hard to quantify – even though they do affect how attractive a job is to prospective employees. So, businesses argue that you’re blocked from setting higher pay for less attractive jobs (like warehouse work, in Next’s case). 

So, to avoid litigation, employers would have to increase the amount paid to the more attractive job of ‘equal value’ to match the less attractive role. This means more costs for businesses and could end up in them cutting workers altogether (like how supermarkets have replaced people with self-service checkouts).

Which law firms are involved?

Next is being represented by Eversheds Sutherland, as the firm has a long-standing relationship with the retailer.

Leigh Day is representing the retail workers who are bringing this claim. This is part of the law firm’s programme called ‘Equal Pay Now’. Through this, they’re advocating for over 112,000 store workers employed by Next and five major supermarkets in equal pay litigation.

Why should law firms care?

Next has said it will appeal the Tribunal’s decision — and if it goes ahead, the decision of the appeal will reach far wider than Next.

There are similar claims against five major UK supermarkets (Asda, Tesco, Sainsburys, Morrisons, and Co-op), mostly the difference in pay between female-dominated shop floor roles and male-dominated warehouse roles. The result of Next’s appeal could lead to many more cases like this in retail.

Commercial law firms will be updating their retail clients about these cases. They’ll be advising them to take steps to address equal pay issues (things like conducting job evaluations to identify equal value jobs and pay audits across their employees). These actions can help prevent problems, but there’s still a chance courts might disagree with how employers define job roles.

The newly-elected Labour government has also promised to expand equal pay protections to cover ethnicity and disability. If this happens, we could see more legal avenues to bring cases like this in the future.

Credit: Laura White

TOGETHER WITH 1440* 🤝

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IN OTHER NEWS 🗞

• 🎟️ Ticketmaster’s in trouble again, this time over the Oasis reunion. Thousands of fans complained about ticket prices soaring while they waited in line. The government plans to investigate the company’s ‘dynamic pricing’ practices. They were already looking into high resale prices, but now they’ll dig into this issue too. Earlier this year, the US also sued Ticketmaster's parent company, Live Nation, for monopolising the concert industry (we wrote about that here).

• 📉 M&A activity in the UK fell to a four-year low in June. This was mostly due to election uncertainty, with deals totalling £11.8 billion in the second quarter (down from £13.5 billion earlier this year). Despite this, experts are hopeful that things will improve by year-end, especially with the potential for a capital gains tax hike pushing sellers to act quickly before the Autumn Budget.

• 🧘‍♀️ There’s a trademark battle for the “very demure, very mindful” meme. Four people have filed trademark applications with the US Patent and Trademark Office, (and one of them is the meme’s creator, TikToker Jools Lebron). The others are Jefferson Bates, Kassandra Pop, and Almondia White — who have each filed for different versions. The applications will be reviewed, and Lebron could oppose them during the consultation period. Here’s a summary of the applications (and, yes, it’s very mindful).

• 🏙️ There’s been a call to help place trainees in a role, as top US law firm shuts its London office. Armstrong Teasdale is closing its London office soon. The firm started its UK operations three years ago after buying the firm Kerman & Co. This closure puts the roles of 10 trainees at risk (with found set to qualify next month!). The City of London Law Society has asked its members for help in finding new placements for the trainees.

AROUND THE WEB 🌐

• 👩‍✈️ Interesting: This site lets you listen to live audio of air traffic controllers across the planet (it’s surprisingly good background study noise)

• 😺 Cats: How many famous internet cats can you recognise?

• 🔵 Experiment: Is my blue the same as your blue? This will show you (here’s my result 👇️ )

  

Credit: r/internetisbeautiful

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STUFF THAT MIGHT HELP YOU 👌

• 📹️ Free application help: If you're applying to commercial law firms, check out my YouTube channel for actionable tips and an insight into the lifestyle of a commercial lawyer in London.

• 🌈 Queer City Lawyers event: This careers event (hosted by some top firms) offers LGBTQ+ students a chance to explore careers in commercial law. Attendees will hear from lawyers at different career stages about their experiences and routes into law. Sign up now.