Watch more of our videos on Shots!
and live on Freeview channel 276

The most expensive year was 2019-2020 when it spent over £1m on external lawyers

Peterborough City Council (PCC) has spent £7.8m on lawyers over the past decade, a Freedom of Information (FOI) request has revealed.

The most expensive year for third party lawyers in this period was 2019-20, when PCC spent more than £1.1m on their services.

While the council has an in-house legal team as well as legal advisors, it will sometimes contract external lawyers to make representations for it at hearings or inquests.

Peterborough council leader calls for change in fireworks law

Between July 2022 and July 2023, for instance, PCC was the applicant – i.e. initiated proceedings – in 529 child protection hearings, utilising private lawyers for 220 of these.

In the majority of other types of proceeding (162), its own in-house lawyers represented the council; barristers or outside law firms were called upon five times.

Ordinary proceedings that PCC’s own lawyers might be involved in include taking legal action over trading standards or fly tipping.

However, in some complex cases, particularly relating to child protection, specialists may also be employed

PCC’s 2023/4 budget shows that it proposed budget for all legal services is £1.9m, except for the £100k+ salary of its Director of Legal and Governance services.

This role is currently held by an interim, Adesuwa Omoregie, after the previous incumbent Rochelle Tapping was let go by the council.

PCC’s budget also says that the council is “in the process” of “redesigning” its legal team to promote efficiency and make savings such as by “increasing income targets in leases and compensation”.

Indeed, while lawyers’ fees may run into the thousands, they can also help the council recover greater sums of money in court.

The breakdown for how much PCC spent on private lawyers over the past decade is as follows:

2013-14 – £587,406.99
2014-15 – £747,301.89
2015-16 – £819,251.80
2016-17 – £777,544.81
2017-18 – £782,927.19
2018-19 – £935,570.35
2019-20 – £1,124,067.47
2020-21 – £601,698.24
2021-22 – £817,833.16
2022-23 – £558,805.13
Total – £7,752,407.03

Peterborough City Council spends nearly £8m on third party lawyers in 10 years

Comment Guidelines