Trevor Sterling, a personal injury solicitor at Moore Barlow, has been elected as the first Black senior partner at a UK top 100 law firm.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has responded to pressure from women’s groups and MPs by promising that his government will revive a key domestic abuse bill that would have introduced protections for victims, but was cancelled due to his decision to shutdown Parliament.

The University of Law – one of the UK’s longest-established providers of legal education – has announced a new scholarship scheme to support students affected by the global pandemic.

Tottenham MP David Lammy has criticised members of the government for wrongly insisting that a lack of diversity among judges is due to a shortage of suitable black and minority ethnic (BAME) candidates.

Pro bono charity LawWorks has celebrated the outstanding contributions of students and law school staff to pro bono work at its annual awards ceremony.

Does my physics degree make me more suited to a niche practice area such as patent law?

Magic circle firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has revealed new “ambitious” global diversity targets with all “key global leadership functions” set to have ethnic diversity and at least 40% women and 40% men by 2023.

The Social Welfare Solicitors Qualification Fund, which is backed by 18 major law firms, has secured funding for its first cohort of social welfare legal workers to begin their journey to qualifying as solicitors via the Solicitors Qualifying Exam (SQE).

News of the Sainsbury’s and Asda merger has sent shockwaves through the supermarket sector this week. Designed to fight the pre-eminence of the giant Tesco, as well as helping to see off the Lidl/Aldi success stories, the merger would create a company with 330,000 staff and an annual revenue of around £51 billion. Both supermarkets have vowed that no jobs will be lost, nor stores closed, but MPs have raised concerned about the negative effect on suppliers. For other commercial news, read on.

The backlog of crown court cases in England and Wales has hit a record high of 60,000 cases, with one-fifth of cases taking more than a year to be heard.  

Trigger warning: rape

The University of Law has announced the relocation of its Yorkshire training centre from York to Leeds.

Student conferences NationalLawLIVE and CityLawLIVE have opened their application system, readying themselves to welcome delegates on, respectively, 4 December 2015 and 11 December 2015.

The National Association of Licensed Paralegals (NALP) has been chosen as an End Point Assessment Organisation (EPAO) for the Level 3 Paralegal Apprenticeship Standard.

London-based law firm Hodge Jones & Allen (HJA) has partnered with the charity Pathway, a homeless healthcare service, to provide legal assistance to homeless patients as they seek accommodation after being discharged from hospital. 

Burges Salmon LLP is “thrilled to report” that all of the firm’s 24 qualifying trainees have accepted roles at the firm.

Linklaters, RPC and Taylor Wessing have revealed high trainee retention rates as we emerge from covid-19-induced lockdowns.