Herbert Smith has made five redundancies in its Dubai office following a 51-strong redundancy round at the firm's City headquarters announced last month.

All five of the redundancies are in the Dubai IT and business services functions, with no fee earners or legal staff affected.

The decision to reduce support headcount in Dubai was made around the same time as the firm announced plans to cut back City numbers by just over 3%, with the loss of 51 positions.

Lawyers in the firm's corporate team will bear the brunt of the proposed London cuts, with up to 23 fee-earners at risk of redundancy across the team's associate and of counsel ranks, as well as three professional support lawyers.

A further five London fee-earner positions are at risk in the real estate practice, with one professional support lawyer in the team also affected. The remaining job cuts affect professional support lawyers and personal assistants.

Commenting on the Dubai redundancies a Herbert Smith spokesman said: "It was a decision we took with regret, but one we needed to make to put our business services resources back in step with our fee earner numbers."
The firm has eight partners and a further 25 fee earners in its Dubai office.

Herbert Smith attributed the London job cuts to a partner restructuring last year which saw around 12 corporate and finance partners asked to leave at the close of last year. It said there were no plans for any further redundancies for either support staff or fee earners across its international network.