Surrey authorities launch joint legal panel

Appointments will last for four years, which one panel member described as “a weight around your neck and a bonus at the same time”.

The panel will cover a range of areas including adult services, contract and procurement, education and prosecutions.

The public bodies have awarded places to a range of barristers’ chambers as well as law firms, with Kent County Council, 12 College Place, 1 King’s Bench Walk, 14 Gray’s Inn Square, Blake Lapthorn, Freeth Cartwright and Weightmans among those to win places.

This comes as a growing number of entities, including members of the Tyne & Wear metropolitan authority (The Lawyer, 30 November), have teamed up to extract savings from advisers.