CMS Cameron McKenna is to move to a pure lockstep partnership, bucking the trend towards merit-based pay.

Following a strategic review earlier this year, the firm will join the select band of firms that operate a pure lockstep, that include Slaughter and May and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, by 2005. The new lockstep will operate on a 2:1 ratio over an eight-year period, against its current 10-year track.

Legal Week has learned that the decision to move to a traditional partnership model came out of the same review that hit the headlines in January, when Camerons announced the drastic downsizing of its Asian practice.

The move will result in the phasing out of Camerons' bonus system, which sets aside about 5% of profits to reward high-performing partners, and there will be no scope to promote equity partners other than seniority.

The change comes as the 140-partner firm continues to incorporate its salaried partners into its equity following a decision to return to a full equity partnership in 2000, a process that will take five years.

The shift to a lockstep will draw a line under the protracted financial integration in the wake of the 1997 merger between McKenna & Co and Cameron Markby Hewitt.

The move will also be watched closely by Camerons' rivals as it bucks the trend among mid-tier firms towards using merit-based pay and salaried partners to reward and retain top partners.

Camerons' decision comes despite indications that the firm is currently focusing on raising its average partner profits, which were down by 8.5% this year at £401,000.

Camerons managing partner Dick Tyler said the firm had found performance-based pay could be divisive among the partnership and too time consuming to manage.

Meanwhile, Camerons has also confirmed that it is to cut its rates for newly-qualified lawyers from £50,000 to £48,000. Travers Smith Braithwaite has also made an identical cut. Both firms are following similar moves this year by Clifford Chance, Masons, Simmons & Simmons and SJ Berwin.

Tyler said: "To a significant extent this is market-led. I think the economics had been stretched as far as they could be."