Taken at face value, our research this week on the universities attended by last year's trainee intake at the top 30 law firms is worrying. Recent years have witnessed an upsurge in moves by the UK's leading firms to increase diversity within their ranks. Initiatives like PRIME, whose goal is to improve social mobility by offering work placements for school children from less privileged backgrounds, have had an impressive uptake within the legal profession. A report by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission even said the sector was among those taking the most action on social mobility.

Despite this, our research reveals that graduates from Russell Group universities accounted for 79% of the trainee intake in 2013. And there is, of course, an elite within the elite, with trainees hailing from the hallowed halls of Oxford and Cambridge accounting for a hefty proportion of that Russell Group intake. A three-year comparison indicates these proportions have hardly changed. 

The good news is that there seems to be a broad understanding among the leading firms that if diversity is to be improved it must first be measured. So the fact that 24 of the top 30 firms were prepared to share their data with Legal Week is encouraging. Furthermore, it stands to reason that the benefits of schemes like PRIME will take several years to bear fruit. Efforts being made to widen the recruitment net are also becoming more radical. For example, Clifford Chance has seen its recruitment pool of universities increase by 30% since it introduced CV-blind assessments. 

And yet, the recently published Legal Week Intelligence Law Student Report found that, although the student law population is becoming more diverse, that diversity isn't resulting in a wider range of candidates being offered work placements. This is important as these placements are rated by students as by far the best way of getting information about a firm.  

It can become a vicious circle whereby those from outside of the elite feel alienated, even if firms are trying to encourage a diverse intake of graduates. One student on a placement at a top City firm noted that the rhetoric around diversity did not match the reality. "At every talk, the speaker would emphasise that the firm's reputation [for lack of diversity] was unfair," she said. "This was laughable when talking to a room full of people who illustrate the stereotype."

The student decided the firm wasn't for her. When it comes to broadening the church, the phrase 'two steps forward, one step back' springs to mind.