Field Fisher Waterhouse has kicked off a redundancy consultation that could lead to the departure of four lawyers in the firm's public & regulatory group.

The consultation, first revealed on rollonfriday.com, began earlier this week (22 November) and is likely to take between three and four weeks.

Three associates in London and one in Manchester have been told they are at risk of redundancy, with no-one else included in the consultation.

Separately, the firm has decided to end a number of paralegal and solicitor fixed-term contracts. The firm hired 14 paralegals and three solicitors earlier this year for a one-off project for the public & regulatory group, with all bar four paralegals leaving the firm once the project came to a close.

Managing partner and former head of the public & regulatory group Matthew Lohn (pictured) commented: "The public regulatory market is changing rapidly, with pressure on the public sector resulting in far more work being brought in-house. We are also seeing the work that does go out to tender becoming increasingly price sensitive."

He added: "Regrettably, these factors mean that we also need to make a small number of redundancies in our public and regulatory group. We are currently in consultation with four associates whose posts are at risk of redundancy, however I should stress that as part of this process we will be looking at the possibility of finding positions for them elsewhere in the firm."

Legal Week reported last month that Lohn had taken over from Moira Gilmour as managing partner.