Addleshaw Goddard partners ask junior lawyers to help cover £600 Christmas bar bill

£50 each

A group of junior lawyers at Addleshaw Goddard were asked to dig deep and help cover a £600 Christmas party bar tab.

Celebrating another successful year, Addleshaws’ Leeds-based construction litigation team enjoyed a leisurely lunch last week at the city’s swanky Dakota Deluxe Hotel (pictured top). Those who attended, including trainees and PAs, had pre-paid for their own meal.

In what they presumably thought was a gesture of goodwill, weekly legal blog RollOnFriday reports that Addleshaws’ junior lawyers were under the impression that partners were footing the booze bill. This, according to an unnamed source, “to celebrate the team having yet another amazing financial half year and to mark the Christmas festivities”.

Not so, apparently. The report goes on to claim that a week later the lawyers received an email asking them to cough-up £50 each, to help cover a hefty £600 bar tab. On this, a source said: “I know Yorkshire men have a reputation for being tightfisted but this takes the biscuit.”

There was, however, a sprinkling of festive goodwill courtesy of three of the firm’s partners, who each handed over £100 to help cover their own drinks and those of their PAs, the report adds.

A spokesperson for Addleshaws said: “There is a full programme of subsidised events at the firm and not unusual for lawyers to chip in for other socials where partners readily over-feed the kitty so there is a low or no outlay for PAs in particular.”