Twelve firms boast £1m-plus pay

Twelve UK firms have top equity partners on more than £1m, with those at Slaughter and May breaking the £2m barrier.

Last year eight firms boasted top of equity millionaires, but as figures in The Lawyer UK 200 Annual Report 2007 (published today, 3 September) reveal, the pool is widening.

The firms are largely a mixture of global elite and silver circle City practices. Allen & Overy saw plateau partners receive £1.54m in the last financial year, while their peers at Linklaters pocketed £1.62m.

Other firms on the list are Ashurst, Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP), Clifford Chance, Dickson Minto, DLA Piper, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Macfarlanes, SJ Berwin and Travers Smith.

BLP just made it into the group due to its top earners receiving £1m. Plateau partners at Freshfields received £1.1m, which is below their magic circle counterparts' earnings and equal to SJ Berwin's top of equity. Clifford Chance's plateau partners received £1.15m.

Slaughters is the only firm at which the entire partnership is on more than £1m. Plateau partners at the firm, who constitute well over two-thirds of the partnership, made £2.03m, while first-year equity partners broke the £1m barrier for the first time.