McGrigors set for City office redundancies

Scottish-headquartered firm McGrigors is cutting a number of jobs in its London office with fee earners and secretaries in the real estate and banking practices likely to be affected.

Managing partner Richard Masters said a consultation process began yesterday (29 May) that is likely to result in four real estate fee earners, none of whom are partners, and three secretaries as well as two banking secretaries being made redundant. At this stage it is not known whether it will be possible to offer the people concerned jobs elsewhere in the firm.

"This is a direct result off market conditions," Masters added.

Masters said the consultation will be confined to these practice areas with the London office the only one in the network to be affected.

McGrigors is the latest in a line of firms to announce redundancies. North West firm Brabners Chaffe Street is contemplating lay-offs in its construction and property finance groups after gloomy predictions for 2008 (see story) and Bevan Brittan is set to make up to 40 redundancies as it kickstarts a three-year strategy plan to bolster profitability (see story)

In a further cost cutting measure, McGrigors is also consulting on putting a stop to a lunch voucher scheme that was put in place as a result of the firm's merger with KLegal, which it split from in 2004.

Masters explained that during the firm's time with KLegal it had a dedicated canteen in London and employees were given money towards their canteen lunch each day. He added that as part of a benefits overhaul this scheme would probably cease at the end of the firm's financial year in September.

"The benefits package that we offer our staff remains highly competitive, indeed as part of the new Valuing People programme introduced last year, staff gained an extra 1.5 days' holiday," Masters added.