REBEL WITH A CAUSE

Joanna Hughes is not your typical City lawyer - if, indeed, there is such a thing. She’s a tad different, a bit of a rebel and a woman of many passions.

To continue the film analogy, there is no such thing as a mission impossible for her. Once her mind is made up and her heart is set, watch out world because nothing is going to stop her.

After a quarter of a century practising in a major law firm, Jo decided the time was right to dedicate herself full time to fulfilling her dreams - and, in so doing, enabling others to do the same.

She is the co-CEO of City Century which, for anyone who may have been hiding under a stone in recent years, is ‘a multi-award winning solicitor apprenticeship initiative that identifies, recruits, educates, and develops the very best talent, connecting them to the City of London.’

Recently, the Government announced they wanted to rebalance apprenticeship levy funding away from older people in favour of young people on the basis that Level 7 apprenticeships - the level which solicitor apprenticeships fall into - were mainly for middle aged, middle-class people. This is absolutely not the case where solicitor apprenticeships are concerned.

Levy funding is where companies of a certain size pay a levy irrespective of whether they operate apprenticeships or not - that money goes into a pool and, if you are a firm with apprentices, you take money out of that to cover the training costs. The proposal would have meant that even firms

with apprentices would no longer be able to access these monies. Clearly this would have been a major setback for the scheme.

Needless to say, Jo took up the gauntlet on behalf of law firms that are members of the City Century collaboration. The Solicitor Trailblazer Group represented the legal profession more generally. Jo spent several months doing pro bono lobbying - and considers the outcome of this work a success. She was delighted and grateful that the Department for Education listened to her arguments and evidence, and an age exemption from the levy funding cuts was secured; an example of how the Government is prioritising young people as part of its Youth Guarantee.

Whether that success can be perceived as total or partial depends on perspective. Funding will be removed from Level 7 apprenticeships from January 2026, while maintaining support for those aged 21 or under (24 or under for care leavers) when they start their apprenticeship and existing apprentices. This means that funding for the 6-year solicitor apprenticeship used by City Century law firms (which is the one that Jo believes has the biggest social mobility impact) will be unaffected if firms continue to focus their recruitment on school leavers or those who left school recently. Obviously, for graduate apprenticeships, most of whom are over 21 when they start, unfortunately, miss out.

The sheer strength of submissions from Jo and others in the legal profession and in other sectors against the initial proposal were such that the Government extended their timeframe for this in order to look into the detail more acutely. Many believe that the solicitor apprenticeship lobbying changed the outcome for all Level 7 funding.

Jo says:

“I honestly see this as the biggest moment in my career; working collaboratively with the Government, we succeeded in protecting the availability and the perception of the solicitor apprenticeship route into law. While it would have been better of course not to lose any Level 7 funding, my priority has always been school leavers from low socio-economic backgrounds".

Obviously, Jo was not alone in this charge; alongside her every step of the way were Colin Passmore, the Chair of the CLLS and Patrick McCann, Jo’s co-CEO in City Century and CEO of the CLLS. Jo, Colin and Patrick are all grateful to the Ministry of Justice for their support throughout. And I feel it is true to say that our profession is more than grateful to Jo for her unswerving dedication in ensuring young people from all walks of life have the opportunity and financial backing to become the solicitors of the future.