This statement is made by Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP, a law firm and limited liability partnership registered in England and Wales and authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (England and Wales). The statement is made pursuant to section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 for the financial year ending 30 April 2018. It sets out the overall commitment and steps taken to ensure that slavery and human trafficking are not present in its business or direct supply chain.
BCLP Group structure
On 1 April 2018, Berwin Leighton Paisner LLP (“BLP LLP”) combined with Bryan Cave LLP, and BLP LLP changed its name to Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP (“BCLP UK”) .
The Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner Group (“BCLP Group”) has 31 offices in 11 countries and provides legal and related services to corporates and individuals. A list of the BCLP Group entities (“BCLP Firms”) and legal and regulatory information regarding them (including corporate registration details, contact details, list of Partners and information about the way the BCLP Firms and their lawyers are regulated and insured, as appropriate) is contained in the legal notices section of our website. BCLP UK continues to be required under the Act to publish a statement.
The BCLP Group is committed to carrying on its business in a responsible and ethical manner that respects the rights and dignity of individuals and the communities where it operates and provides its services. The BCLP Group has a zero tolerance policy concerning modern slavery and human trafficking and expects the same high standards and commitment from those it does business with. As part of BCLP UK’s ongoing commitment to take steps towards ensuring there is no risk of modern slavery and human trafficking in its operations and supply chain, we will be reviewing our approach in light of our post-combination structure, including relevant business and operational profile and relationships, and will seek to address these issues in future statements.
Given the timing of the completion of the combination, this statement focuses on the efforts of the UK operations of BCLP UK up to 1 April 2018. BCLP UK had a consolidated global turnover of £264m for the financial year ending 30 April 2018 and employed over 1200 staff.
Our approach
To properly and transparently address the risks of modern slavery we have developed a systematic, risk based approach to identifying and assessing the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking within our business and direct supply chain.
As a business which is regulated, has a zero tolerance approach to modern slavery and human trafficking and comprehensive employment policies and practices (including diversity and inclusivity, equal opportunities and non-discrimination, flexible working and anti-harassment), BCLP UK has assessed its own business as low risk for modern slavery and human trafficking issues.
We are committed to assessing any situations of concern regarding modern slavery and human trafficking on a case by case basis. Our Whistleblowing Policy provides a channel of communication for staff who have concerns; we have a Complaints Policy in place should clients wish to make a complaint; and our Supplier Code encourages suppliers to raise any issues of concern with us. BCLP UK’s Compliance Officer for Legal Practice (a position which is mandatory under applicable regulation) is also a key point of contact both internally and externally and has a regulatory duty to ensure that BCLP UK takes all reasonable steps to comply with its statutory obligations.
In light of the above, over the last year, our focus has been and continues to be on:
- BCLP UK’s operations in England which is the location of our largest office with the greatest number of staff and the most significant proportion of our business and turnover;
- our core legal services business; and
- our direct commercial supply chain.
Report on KPIs and next steps
In the last financial year ending 30 April 2018 we have progressed a number of initiatives including:
- reviewed the way in which we resource the on-boarding and management of our suppliers
- risk rated over 700 suppliers for the UK office
- worked towards embedding our commercial supplier on-boarding and contract management approach beyond our UK focused initial phase to identify material commercial suppliers to our non-UK offices
- reviewed and updated our procurement process to ensure that addressing the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking is incorporated into our approach to ad hoc and low value suppliers
- reviewed and updated our internal resources to enable staff to manage direct commercial supplier relationships
- continued to embed our supplier on-boarding and contract management approach which promotes responsible and ethical relationships, by improving the skills and capacity of our UK based staff who deal with our direct commercial suppliers, providing staff training on our mandatory commercial supplier on-boarding process
- continued to promote our Ethical Business Principles (which were approved by the BLP LLP Board in 2016)
- continued to advise and work with clients in a number of sectors to develop their approach to managing the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking and broader human rights issues such as the implementation of UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises on Responsible Business Conduct
- continued to raise awareness and sharing of knowledge and best practice across the legal profession in respect of modern slavery, human rights and responsible business practices issues by:
- contributing to the development of International Bar Association guidance and tools on Human Rights Due Diligence for Corporate and Commercial transactions and training programs;
- participating in a Law Firm Peer Learning Process to discuss emerging best practice for identification and management of modern slavery and human rights risk issues in our sector;
- supporting the development of Manchester University’s Business and Human Rights Catalyst, including an inter-disciplinary executive education course; and
- speaking at global business and human rights conferences and events, including the UN Annual Forum on Business and Human Rights in Geneva in December 2017.
We have found no issues in relation to modern slavery and human trafficking related to our direct commercial suppliers in the context of goods and services supplied to BCLP UK in England.
Next steps
As a result of the combination, the accounting year end of BCLP UK has changed from 30 April to 31 December. These next steps are therefore relevant to the period from 1 May 2018 to 31 December 2018.
During the course of that period we aimed to:
- begin a review of our approach to the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking in light of the combination and resulting change in group structure and scope of operations;
- refine our existing commercial supplier on-boarding and contract management approach;
- begin implementation of new contract management software;
- begin to review our commercial supplier on-boarding and contract management approach for offices outside of the UK;
- continue our dialogue with other international law firms about responsible and ethical business and supply chains with the aim of putting relevant peer learning into practice ourselves;
- contribute to the legal sector’s engagement with this issue by contributing to initiatives and speaking at global business and human rights conferences and events; and
- provide advice to and work with our clients and other entities with whom we have business relationships about how to eradicate the risk of modern slavery and human trafficking in their businesses and supply chains.
Date - 1.2.19

Lisa Mayhew
Designated member of Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP