Women in Law Pledge

Deka Chambers is a proud signatory of the Women in Law Pledge, created by The Bar Council of England & Wales, The Law Society and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx).

We are committed to the progress of equality, elimination of sex discrimination and pledge to make positive changes for the legal profession.

The Women in Law Pledge is a commitment to work together to harness the power of gender equality to transform the business of law.

Deka Chambers pledges to promote gender equality by:

1. Having a named member of our senior leadership team/management committee who is accountable for gender diversity and inclusion;
2. Setting specific gender targets at leadership level and at other levels as appropriate;
3. Considering the different outcomes for different groups of women at all levels of the organisation e.g. their background, identity and range of experiences;
4. Developing an action plan to achieve gender equality in our senior management and leadership teams;
5. Committing at senior level to tackle sex discrimination, bullying and sexual harassment in the workplace;
6. Committing to tackle workplace culture and bias that may result in differential outcomes in the workplace;
7. Making public our pledge and sharing our targets and action plan.

At Deka Chambers we will support the Pledge by carrying out the following activities:

• Task the Equality & Diversity committee with monitoring the progress of our activities on a six-monthly basis.
• Continue to ensure that women are represented on the Management Committee, and that any existing or new committees within Chambers offer the opportunity to have at least 25% female membership where possible.
• Monitor equal access to and fair allocation of work in Chambers, and ensure that female members are given equal access to be led on significant and high profile cases.
• Monitor equal access to marketing and business development initiatives, including speaking opportunities and client introductions.
• Monitor the pay, billings and income of members for gender disparity.
• Review our retention rates over the past five years, with a view to achieving parity of retention between male and female members.
• Support female members in their preparation for silk or judicial applications, with a view to increasing the number of women in silk by 2025.
• Review our Parental and Carer’s Leave policies and our Flexible Working policy regularly in line with the Bar Council’s guidelines.
• Review the support offered to members taking parental leave, engaging with them whilst on leave, if the member wants this, and introduce a structured programme to support members before and during their leave and on their return to Chambers.
• Be sensitive to caring responsibilities when arranging Chambers’ meetings and events.
• Offer women the opportunity to talk openly with one another in an informal environment.
• Continue to invite members to speak openly, and confidentially if required, to the Equality & Diversity Officer about any equality and diversity issues they may wish to address.
• Review equality and diversity training and ensure comprehensive training is available and undertaken by all those responsible for recruiting and for allocating work.
• Publicise our commitment to the pledge on our website and social media channels.
• Report our progress to the Bar Council on an annual basis.