Watson Farley & Williams' highest- paid member took home £1.26m during the last financial year, marginally more than the equivalent figure of £1.23m in 2008-09.

The figure is contained within the firm's recently-filed LLP accounts, which also show that turnover for the LLP, which does not include all of the firm's international offices, stood at £56.9m, against £18.4m of profit available for discretionary division between the 60 members.

Total staff costs for the LLP in 2009-10 stood at £18.6m, compared with £19.1m the previous year, with total staff numbers also dropping marginally from 233 to 223.

The accounts also show that the firm had total borrowings of £3.04m at 30 April 2010, compared with £3.5m at the same point in 2009. These include an unsecured bank loan of £382,292 used to fund the LLP's professional indemnity insurance premium and £1.07m used to fund the LLP's expenditure on premises improvements.

Firmwide, Watson Farley saw turnover grow by 9.1% during 2009-10 to reach £80.2m, up from the previous year's total of £73.5m, while profits per equity partner rose by 4.2% to £448,000 from £430,000.

Watson Farley managing partner Michael Greville said: "The accounts are wholly consistent with what we said in June and the audit has not produced any major changes.

"We were very pleased with our 2009-10 results and the profitability of the business and expect this to continue in 2011."

Watson Farley's LLP accounts do not include the firm's Greece, Thailand, Italy, Madrid and New York offices, while the Singapore office was transferred out of the LLP as of 1 November 2009.