DLA Piper and Pannone cutting jobs
LAW firm DLA Piper is to begin a redundancy consultation programme with more than 250 lawyers and back office staff.
It wants to centralise its 116-strong document production unit in Leeds which will affect 14 jobs in Manchester and 13 in Liverpool.
The firm is also looking at the closure of its Glasgow office, which employs 85, and the sale, or closure, of its defendant insurance practice which is largely based across its Sheffield and Birmingham offices. It has four partners, 27 fee earners and 19 support staff.
Transfers to Leeds will be offered to staff based in the firm’s other UK offices in Birmingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, London, Manchester and Sheffield. The consultations will involve around 10% of the firm’s UK staff, it is understood.
A spokesperson for the firm said: “Following a comprehensive review of our UK business designed to ensure that we are operating in a manner, in the locations, and across the practice areas that support both our strategic objectives and the needs of our clients, we have begun a period of consultation in the UK that will consider the possible closure of our Glasgow office, the closure or divestment of our Defendant Insurance Practice and the consolidation into one location of our current multi-site Document Production Unit.”
The consultation will begin on November 28 and is expected to be completed in the new year.
Meanwhile Manchester-based Pannone is looking to cut its staff numbers by up to 16 in its second round of redundancies this year.
The jobs affected include fee-earning roles in the firm’s corporate services, dispute resolution and regulatory teams, as well as support roles in the firm’s finance practice.
Managing partner Emma Holt said: “Pannone has undertaken a strategic review of the business in order to re-shape our teams to meet client demands and embrace the evolving legal market.”
