The short answer
The SRA’s own diversity monitoring shows Black, Asian and minority ethnic solicitors are overrepresented at successive stages of its enforcement process. On the 2023/24 data they make up 19% of the practising population of known ethnicity, 26% of concerns received, and 33% of matters taken forward for investigation. Independent research commissioned by the regulator found firm size and practice area intersect with ethnicity but do not fully account for the pattern. No review has found evidence of discrimination within the SRA’s processes, and the research did not conclude that decision-makers act with overt bias.
A note on terminology
This article uses “Black, Asian and minority ethnic” rather than the acronym, following the SRA’s own current usage in its research and reporting. Where figures are quoted for specific groups, they are given separately, because aggregate categories can obscure materially different patterns.
What the data shows
The SRA publishes annual diversity monitoring of its investigation and enforcement work, which is what makes this subject examinable at all.
On the 2023/24 report, Black, Asian and minority ethnic solicitors represent 19% of the practising population of known ethnicity, 26% of concerns received, and 33% of matters taken forward for investigation. Within that, Asian solicitors are around 13% of the profession and approximately 24% of investigations; Black solicitors around 3% of the profession and approximately 6% of investigations.
The pattern is not new and it is not confined to one year. In 2020/21 Asian solicitors made up 12% of the practising population, 18% of those reported, and 25% of those taken forward for investigation. The SRA has reported overrepresentation consistently across five-year comparisons at the reporting and assessment stages.
Two features of the pattern matter analytically. Disproportionality increases as matters progress from report to investigation, which points towards the assessment stage rather than the reporting stage alone. And overrepresentation also appears in practising conditions imposed.
Context worth stating
Men are also overrepresented in the SRA’s enforcement processes, and the regulator notes that patterns of this kind are seen across many professions and regulators. Neither observation resolves the question, but both bear on whether the cause is specific to the SRA’s processes or wider than them.
Two decades of reviews
This is not a recently identified problem, and the history matters for assessing what the current research adds.
The Law Society undertook work on the subject in 2006. The SRA’s own diversity monitoring reported overrepresentation up to 2014, and the regulator commissioned a series of independent reviews over the following years, including the Independent Comparative Case Review conducted by Professor Gus John examining fairness in its enforcement processes.
The SRA’s stated position on those earlier reviews is specific: none found evidence of discrimination within its processes, and each produced recommendations that shaped its approach to enforcement. When the regulator resumed diversity monitoring of its enforcement work in 2020, the overrepresentation was again evident, and particularly so at the earliest stages.
That sequence is the reason the most recent research was commissioned. Repeated reviews finding no discrimination within the process, alongside a pattern that persists, pointed the inquiry towards structural and societal factors outside the decision itself.
What the independent research examined
The SRA commissioned researchers from York, Lancaster and Cardiff to examine the factors causing overrepresentation, with the final report published in October 2024.
The study focused on two stages the regulator had identified as most concerning: the reports it receives, of which there are around 10,000 a year about solicitors, firms and others working in law firms, and the assessment at which it decides which reports to take forward.
The methodology is worth setting out, because it determines what the findings can support:
- Quantitative analysis of enforcement cases, testing variables including firm size, practice area, reporting source and ethnicity
- An onsite visit to the SRA
- Desk-based analysis of the induction, training and guidance materials given to staff making initial assessment decisions, including the Assessment Tests criteria and the Enforcement Strategy
- Review of two modules from the SRA’s equality, diversity and inclusion e-learning
- Fourteen online semi-structured interviews with Investigation Officers and Investigation Managers in the Assessment Team
The SRA described the conclusion as a complex issue with no single or simple solution. The researchers found that factors such as firm size and practice area intersect with ethnicity and affect, but do not fully account for, the overrepresentation observed.
Firm size and practice area
Two structural factors do substantial explanatory work, and both are actionable in a way that the residual is not.
Firm size. Black, Asian and minority ethnic solicitors are disproportionately represented in smaller firms and sole practices. Smaller practices generally have less compliance infrastructure and fewer internal risk management mechanisms than large commercial firms, so a matter that might be resolved internally at a larger firm is more likely to reach the regulator. Structural position in the legal market therefore influences exposure to enforcement independently of conduct.
Practice area. Minority ethnic solicitors are more likely to practise in high-intensity public-facing fields including immigration, criminal defence and family law. These involve vulnerable clients, urgent matters and emotionally charged disputes, conditions that generate higher complaint rates generally.
Both factors are compounded by the regulatory environment. Proactive supervision has expanded, particularly on anti-money laundering compliance, and inspection has found substantial proportions of firms non-compliant. Smaller firms face the same evolving requirements with less capacity to meet them, which our guide to firm wide risk assessments addresses directly.
Reading the figures carefully
Coverage of this subject is improved by acknowledging what the data cannot support, and the SRA’s own reports do so.
The reliability of the analysis differs by stage. In the 2022/23 report, stages one and two involved 7,885 and 1,432 individuals respectively, allowing reasonably reliable conclusions. Stages three and four involved 265 and 111 individuals, and the SRA cautions against drawing conclusions from small numbers, where a change of a few cases produces a large percentage movement.
That caution matters for how the subject is discussed. The strong evidence concerns the reporting and assessment stages. Claims about disparities in final sanction rest on much smaller samples and should be made more tentatively.
The distinction between disproportionality, causation and intent also has to be held throughout. The data establishes unequal outcomes at several stages. It does not establish that the regulator imposes harsher sanctions for equivalent misconduct, and the research did not conclude that decision-makers act with overt racial bias. What it did find is that ethnicity remained statistically associated with progression outcomes after controlling for contextual factors, which is a narrower but still significant claim.
Three different questions
Are outcomes unequal? The data says yes. Is that explained by contextual factors? Partly, but not fully. Is it caused by discrimination in the SRA’s decision-making? No review has found that, and the research did not conclude it. Conflating the three produces claims the evidence does not support in either direction.
What the SRA has done
In response to the 2024 report the regulator set out measures, including more effectively tailoring compliance and support materials to smaller and one-partner firms, in light of the particular challenges those firms face.
It also committed to keeping the issue under review, to improving how it handles data as part of an organisation-wide data strategy, and to continuing to publish annual diversity monitoring of its enforcement processes.
Whether that is sufficient is a matter of legitimate disagreement. The measures target the structural factors the research identified rather than the residual association between ethnicity and progression, which is the part the research could not explain. Critics within the profession have made that point; the regulator’s position is that the causes are complex and partly external to its processes.
The broader context is a regulator already under scrutiny. The Legal Services Board has taken enforcement action against the SRA, and reports of potential misconduct have risen sharply, as our guide to SRA investigations sets out. Rising volume applied to a process with an identified disparity does not reduce the disparity.
What this means in practice
For individual solicitors and small firms, the research points to practical exposure that can be reduced even where its causes cannot.
Compliance infrastructure is the factor most within a firm’s control. The research found that matters resolved internally at larger firms are more likely to reach the regulator when they arise at smaller ones, which makes a documented internal complaints process and a functioning risk register protective rather than bureaucratic.
Practice area concentration cannot be changed, but its consequences can be anticipated. Firms in immigration, criminal defence and family work operate in fields that generate complaints structurally, and first-tier complaint handling is where most of those are resolved or escalated. Our guide to Legal Ombudsman complaints covers what good handling requires.
And for anyone facing an investigation, the general position applies regardless of these findings: engage early, take specialist advice, and keep contemporaneous records, because the evidential picture is what determines outcomes.
Frequently asked questions
Are minority ethnic solicitors overrepresented in SRA enforcement?
Yes, on the regulator’s own data. On the 2023/24 report Black, Asian and minority ethnic solicitors make up 19% of the practising population of known ethnicity, 26% of concerns received and 33% of matters taken forward for investigation.
Has the SRA been found to discriminate?
No. The SRA states that none of the independent reviews it has commissioned has found evidence of discrimination within its processes, and the 2024 research did not conclude that decision-makers act with overt racial bias. The research did find that ethnicity remained statistically associated with progression outcomes after controlling for contextual factors.
What explains the overrepresentation?
Partly firm size and practice area. Minority ethnic solicitors are disproportionately in smaller firms with less compliance infrastructure, and in immigration, criminal and family work which generate higher complaint rates. The research found these factors affect but do not fully account for the pattern.
At which stage does the disparity widen?
The assessment stage, where the SRA decides which of around 10,000 annual reports to progress to investigation. Disproportionality increases between the report stage and the investigation stage, which is why the independent research focused on those two points.
Is the data reliable at every stage?
Not equally. The SRA cautions against drawing conclusions where numbers are low. The early stages involve thousands of individuals and support reasonably reliable analysis; later stages involve a few hundred or fewer, where small changes produce large percentage movements.
What has the SRA done in response?
It committed to tailoring compliance and support materials more effectively to smaller and one-partner firms, to improving its handling of data as part of an organisation-wide data strategy, to keeping the issue under review, and to continuing annual diversity monitoring of its enforcement processes.
The key points
- The disparity is documented by the regulator itself: 19%, 26%, 33% across the pipeline
- It widens at assessment: between report received and investigation opened
- Firm size and practice area explain part of it: but not all of it
- No review has found discrimination in SRA processes: across two decades of inquiry
- Later-stage figures rest on small samples: the SRA itself advises caution there
The practical takeaway
The evidence supports a narrower claim than the strongest version of the argument, and a stronger one than the weakest. Outcomes are unequal across the enforcement pipeline, structural factors account for part of that, and something remains unexplained after those factors are controlled for.
Public confidence in regulation depends on outcomes appearing fair as well as being procedurally neutral. Where a pattern persists across two decades of review, transparency about what the data does and does not show is the minimum the profession should expect, and continued publication of the monitoring is what makes the question answerable at all.