Kent in-housers seek to cut £3m of legal costs by 2014
The legal team at Kent County Council (KCC) has launched a programme aimed at cutting legal costs by £3m before April 2014.
Geoff Wild
The six-pronged programme, dubbed the ’Evolution’ project, is expected to save the council £1m in legal fees by the end of this year and £3m within two years.
The team plans to introduce a training programme and consultation service with the aim of reducing the amount of internal legal work it does, allowing it to increase its focus on external work.
“At the moment we have an 80/20 internal/external split in legal work,” said KCC’s legal chief Geoff Wild. “We want to move that to 60/40. By doing that we not only reduce costs to Kent but also increase our profitability.”
Overhead costs are expected to drop by £200,000 within the first 12 months of the project, starting with the launch of a new case management system that is expected to significantly reduce the costs of manually processing documents from July this year.
Training is another area where KCC expects to make savings. Having piloted a training scheme for its lawyers last year, the legal team expects to save £50,000 a year by moving its training in-house on a permanent basis.
Lawyers in the middle of their careers, however, might not benefit from the changes, said Wild, adding that a consequence of the changes could be an “hourglass recruitment model” in the future.
“The focus will be on retaining and recruiting the best senior lawyers while attracting bright junior lawyers,” added Wild. “This hourglass model may result in a pinch in the middle.”
The project marks a permanent shift in strategy for the legal team, which is also looking into the prospect of launching an ABS later this year.
“This is far more than a theoretical, salami-slicing exercise or a corporate comb-over,” said Wild of the overall project.
The six strands of the project are:
- Challenging overheads and actively reducing them
- Introducing technology to improve performance and reduce cost
- Critically examining our relationship with KCC and how we can help colleagues to reduce legal risk and cost
- Looking at the appropriate vehicles for the provision of our services, including the exploration of Alternative Business Structures
- Ensuring that legal services meets KCC’s needs now and is prepared to meet those of the future
- Embracing and delivering new and different ways of working
View results 10 per page | 20 per page
Readers' comments (20)
Marshall Hall | 25-Apr-2012 5:40 pm
Funny this.
I'm sure that County Councils are supposed to do stuff like road-sweeping, education, care etc. for their own local population.
Since when was a County Council's Legal Department supposed to actively want to ditch their own legal work, in favour presumably of doing work for other councils...?
Any chance of Kent CC's snow clearers giving up on the Kent roads but making a pitch for clearing Yorkshire's roads? Is this the much vaunted 'new paradigm' perhaps?
Total and utter madness - the lunatics have truly taken charge of the asylum...
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Kim Philby | 26-Apr-2012 8:59 am
Wanting to know what"salami-slicing exercise or a corporate comb over" is to those who don't speak corporatese.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 26-Apr-2012 9:24 am
Like many others, I harbour doubts about how Kent County Council's offer of external legal services complies with the EC rules on state aids.
In this article it is clear that the same workforce is providing both the internal and external legal work. The problem with that approach, as cases like Hofner demonstrate, is that the council is operating within a market (the provision of legal services) whilst using public money. That the profits are recycled is irrelevant.
I'm sure that the council is acting in a compliant manner, but its far from obvious exactly how they are managing that .
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 26-Apr-2012 4:02 pm
My council also sells microwaves and groceries.
It doesn't of course, but it's as bizarre as this situation.
Surely this is state aid.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 26-Apr-2012 6:48 pm
Firms bidding for public sector work must have recognised that this is state aids by KCC. I can only imagine these rivals are holding off so the interest on the aid that will become repayable is greater.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 27-Apr-2012 2:26 pm
I pity the firm that has signed off on the state aids approach.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 27-Apr-2012 6:44 pm
Anon 2.26pm, no law firm would. It would be madness to take such a high risk.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Partial Maul | 1-May-2012 11:53 am
The state aid question is a reasonable one, but Marshall Hall's position is odd: KCC aren't doing external legal work for free instead of doing work for Kent residents, but rather to raise revenue, which improves the service the council is able to offer.
Also, it isn't 'ditching' Kent legal work, but instead trying to move to a position where there isn't as much unncecessary work to do -- something that all councils should learn from. The assumption that all longwinded processes and painful bureaucracy are essential is why so many public sector staff are so bad at efficiency saving.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 2-May-2012 8:35 pm
Anyone who crticises this entrepreneurial and inspiring initiative either misses the point entirely, is overcome by envy or is happy to have flaccid, sedentary bureaucrats as their local authority employees (possibly all three). As for state "aids", as I understand it, Kent's lawyers don't receive a penny from their council in either corporate funding, subsidy or provision of overheads. They are not guaranteed Kent's work and, other than in fees earned, all other expenses and overheads are shown above the line. They are net contributors to the public purse, not a drain on public funds. They are saving their council money and keeping other public sector bodies' legal costs down. In fact, the only ones to lose out are us in the private sector. More power to Wild and Co!
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment
Anonymous | 3-May-2012 10:49 am
As a local authority, Kent County Council had special dispensation for the purposes of state aids, but the moment they entered the legal services market, that cover disappeared. Therefore it does look like KCC did fall foul of state aids.
Of course, they could clear all this up by putting a statement on their webpage explaining how they achieved compliance with the European Regulations on state aids.
I'm surprised their rivals don't complain.
Unsuitable or offensive? Report this comment