Freshfields ‘ report showed that the mean overall gender pay gap, which incorporates partner remuneration, had actually widened since last year, going from 53.2% to 53.5% in 2022.

When comparing the median gender pay gap, the gap was even more stark, jumping to 46.1% , from 14.8% the year before. The firm attributed this particularly steep hike to “structural changes to business services which has changed the distribution of colleagues overall”.

However, gaps persisted across all levels of seniority. At the trainee and associate level, there was a 4% gap in mean hourly rate of pay, which swelled to 12.6% when comparing bonus figures.

At  Clifford Chance , the gap has also widened. While the number of men receiving bonuses had increased by 3.7%, to hit 68.1% from last year, the same figure for women had decreased by 1.5% and now stands at 66%.

The pay gap had also widened when comparing the mean hourly rates, with women now, on average, earning 17.2% less than men, up from 16.7 % last year.

The pay gap at the partner level has also increased by 1.4%. Things were slightly more promising on the associate front, with female associates getting paid on average 2% less than men, down from 4% last year.

Since the firm started disclosing its pay gap seven years ago, the overall mean gap has shrunk by a modest 7.5%, while the median gap has changed even less, decreasing by 2.9%.

In its report, the firm acknowledged the relative lack of progress, stating that it recognises the “challenges we still face in achieving our targets, specifically in relation to gender”, adding: “We are continuing to evolve our people strategy to drive change in the way that we recruit and develop a diverse workforce across all areas of our firm and specially to redress the balance of what has become the structural norm, with a larger proportion of our female colleagues in business support roles.”

At  Linklaters , despite the firm having a female senior partner and women making up 50% of its ‘director group’, the gender pay gap for FTE total earnings remained around the 60% mark, with little change from the previous year.

It had, however, managed to decrease the gap in mean pay between equity partners, which now stands at 17.8%.

At  Allen & Overy , while the mean earnings gap has decreased since last year, it still stands at over 50%. The firm attributed the large gap to “a significantly higher proportion of our most junior legal, secretarial and business roles”, which are the firm’s lowest paying roles, to being held mostly by women.

The pay gap at partner level was comparable to its counterparts at 17.7%.

At  Slaughter and May , the firm omitted gender pay gap data for partners, specifying that “as a full lockstep firm, all partners promoted at the same time are remunerated equally”.

It added: “They also do not receive any additional payments such as bonuses.”

On the associate level however, the firm revealed a pay gap of 1.3%, unchanged from last year, and “no bonus pay gap”.

Commenting on the latest reports, Dana Denis-Smith, founder of equality for women in law campaign group  Next 100 Years   and CEO of consulting company  Obelisk Support   said:  “While there are notable exceptions, most large law firms are making incredibly slow progress when it comes to pay equality—the U.K. legal sector has a far wider pay gap than the U.K. average and once we focus in on larger firms, many of whom do not include partner pay, the situation is even worse.

“Firms say they are committed to change and many provide data that goes beyond minimum requirements, but we appear to be in paralysis with no realistic prospect of achieving equal pay any time soon.”