At many top firms only about 1% of lawyers are black, and several refuse to offer any data. Credit: Shutterstock

Cooley, Clifford Chance and Latham & Watkins have the highest proportion of black lawyers in the U.K. according to research that lays bare the lack of racial diversity within the profession.

A survey of the 50 largest law firms by Law.com International found Cooley topped the table, with five of its 113 U.K. lawyers saying they are black. Other firms that ranked highly were Ashurst, Ropes & Gray, Shoosmiths and Sidley Austin.

The firms stand out as the few where black lawyers make up at 2% or more of their total U.K. lawyer population. At most of the 39 firms that provided any information about ethnicity around 1% of lawyers disclosed their ethnicity as black. Three per cent of the population in England and Wales is black.

Not all lawyers at the firms disclosed their ethnicity, meaning there could be some black lawyers not recorded in the data. At 20 of the top 25 firms the disclosure rate was 80% or higher.

The figures make for grim reading for campaigners at a time when they are calling for institutions such as law firms to take a stand against racism and improve their diversity in light of Black Lives Matter protests going on around the world.

Justin Stock, Cooley's London managing partner, said in a statement: "While a statistic may say that we are leading on our proportion of black lawyers in London as compared to others in the industry, we are not satisfied.

"These low numbers across the board reflect that we and other firms still have a long way to go to ensuring black lawyers have equal opportunity to succeed within Big Law. We are deeply committed to increasing our own proportion of black lawyers, both in the London market and across the firm, to actively listening to our black lawyers to hear their concerns and shape firm strategy that takes their experiences into consideration, and to effecting further and necessary permanent change."

Even fewer black lawyers have made it to partnership level. Of the 33 firms that offered information, almost two thirds said they had no black partners in their U.K. offices. They included the likes of Allen & Overy, Baker McKenzie, Clyde & Co, CMS and Pinsent Masons.

Vinson & Elkins had the highest proportion of black partners with 6.25%, which amounts to one of its 16 U.K. partners. The firm with the most black partners was Eversheds Sutherland, with two out of 304 in the U.K.

The research also demonstrated the low levels of transparency on the topic by many firms. Out of 50 firms taking part in a wider diversity survey, 11 refused to disclose any ethnicity data for their U.K. lawyers. These included: Kirkland & Ellis and Weil Gotshal & Manges.

Of the remaining 39 firms, several, including Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Slaughter and May, said they were unable to provide a number for black lawyers only and they were categorised alongside Asian and other ethnic minorities.

Other firms declined to provide an overall percentage of black lawyers or claimed GDPR prevented them from disclosing such information, while some said they did not record ethnicity data outside of their U.S. offices.

The numbers appear to be worse among the largest U.K. legal institutions than at smaller practitioners. According data from a wider survey by the Solicitors Regulation Authority in 2019, 3% of all U.K. lawyers are black.

The revelation comes as law firms have been responding to the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, after being restrained by a white policer officer in Minneapolis, U.S. In light of his passing, protests have been taking place all over the world to denounce systemic racism and police brutality.

Several law firms donated to various organizations promoting racial justice and the abolition of systemic racism. Clifford Chance issued 'a call to action for racial equality', and was among several to pledge $100,000 or more to equality initiatives. Others who took action included Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Weil Gotshal & Manges, Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, and Allen & Overy.

Read more:

When #BlackLivesMatter Calls For Urgent Change, It's Looking at Law Firms Too

Diversity Scorecard: African American Lawyers Are Being Left Out