LawCare’s latest research, 'Life in the Law 2025', highlights how legal working culture continues to impact mental wellbeing across the sector.
In parallel, the Bar Council’s 'Wellbeing at the Bar Report 2025' echoes many of the same findings.
LawCare's Chief Executive Elizabeth Rimmer has considered both reports side by side and she says the message is clear: it’s time for collective, sustained action to build a healthier legal culture. As the sector transforms, prioritising wellbeing is essential to create an inclusive, resilient, and fit-for-the-future profession.
Common threads across the sector
Both reports show that the demands of a legal career continue to take a toll on wellbeing. In Life in the Law 2025, nearly 60% of respondents reported poor mental wellbeing. The Wellbeing at the Bar Report 2025 did find an encouraging improvement in wellbeing scores compared to 2023, but nearly a third of respondents reported they did not have good overall levels of wellbeing. Both reports also looked at workloads. Life in the Law 2025 measured work intensity which was found to be high; Wellbeing at the Bar Report 2025 looked at managing workloads, with just over half reporting they were able to successfully manage this.
These shared findings show that the issues are not confined to one branch of the legal sector. Whether working in chambers, in-house, or private practice, the challenges stem from the same pressures, high expectations, long hours and a culture where overwork is normalised.
What needs to change
Whilst working in law can be stimulating, engaging and rewarding, both these reports make for sobering reading. They each provide a deeper understanding of the inherent risks to wellbeing in day-to-day legal practice. But the good news is that these reports point clearly to the evidence-based steps that can mitigate these risks.
1. Workload and working hours
Across all legal roles, actively managing workloads is critical to supporting wellbeing. Taking breaks, booking time off and maintaining boundaries were citied in both reports as important strategies for managing. Flexible working arrangements were also found to be beneficial in both studies.
2. Leadership and support
Both reports underline the importance of supportive leadership and relationships with colleagues. A strong theme from the Bar’s report is the value of collegiality and feeling able to turn to colleagues for support and mentoring, with a recommendation that programmes that support this, should be established and promoted.
3. Inclusion
Both reports highlight that there are some groups within the sector who are more impacted by working practices, such as women, juniors, those with disabilities or people with caring responsibilities. These findings demonstrate the need for chambers, firms and in house teams to acknowledge and address the links between wellbeing and diversity, equality and inclusion.
4. Evidence-based action
The more we measure, evaluate, and share what works, the faster we can make progress. Both Life in the Law 2025 and the Wellbeing at the Bar Report 2025 give us a strong foundation to do this. The next step is using this evidence to shape tangible, targeted interventions and to keep measuring their impact over time.
5. Sustaining a healthy career
Finally, both reports remind us that wellbeing is about sustainability. We need to prepare lawyers not just to enter the profession, but to build long, fulfilling, healthy careers within it. Embedding wellbeing into legal education and training is essential to that goal.
Why collaboration matters
Working together to address the wellbeing challenges in our sector is fundamental to its long-term sustainability.
No single organisation can fix this alone. The factors that influence wellbeing in law are systemic, they are shaped by culture, structure, and expectations. That’s why collaboration between organisations like the Bar Council, LawCare, and others across the sector is so crucial. By sharing our insights and knowledge and aligning our efforts, we can create the momentum for positive systemic change.
So, what can we do?
- Leaders and chambers – Review your working practices. Are your expectations realistic? What programmes and measures can be put in place to support wellbeing and prevent problems arising?
- Organisations and representative bodies – Share, data, insights, and best practice.
- Every individual – If you feel able share your experiences and normalise seeking support, as this challenges the stigma that still prevents many in our sector from seeking help. Prioritise your wellbeing and be intentional about what you do to support it.
The findings of Life in the Law 2025 and Wellbeing at the Bar Report 2025 provide us with a way forward. They remind us that we are one sector, facing shared challenges, and that by acting together, we can improve the working culture in law to better support wellbeing.
Elizabeth is the CEO of LawCare, the mental health charity for the UK legal sector. She started her working life as a solicitor specialising in clinical negligence, practicing at Leigh Day. She joined LawCare from the Institute of Group Analysis, a membership and training organisation for group psychotherapists.
Before that she headed up Alzheimer’s Disease International, a worldwide federation of Alzheimer associations. Elizabeth is Co-Chair of the Helplines Partnership (national charity for support and advice services) and a member of the International Bar Association’s Professional Wellbeing Commission and chairs the Commission’s regulatory and ethics committee.