The Law Society (LS) jointly with the Ministry of Justice (MoJ)
and the Legal Services Board (LSB) intends to commission research
to understand more about 'high street' law firms - the main
providers of legal services and legal aid. The research will help
us to understand more about the providers of legal services ahead
of regulatory changes, the reforms to legal aid, and other
significant changes in the legal sector. This research will act as
an initial baseline with the potential for follow-up research to be
commissioned at a later date to measure the impact of changes once
they have bedded in.
Research requirements
We need information from a large and nationally representative
sample of legal service suppliers. We anticipate this research will
take the form of telephone interviews with 2,000 senior
representatives from law firms operating in England and Wales. A
significant sub-group of this sample should be legal aid suppliers.
Given that most legal services are supplied by smaller law firms we
propose excluding the largest 200 firms (in terms of turnover) from
the research, unless the firm is a legal aid provider.
The research would be expected to provide evidence on the
following:
- business characteristics
- details of current legal service provision (value and volumes),
with particular attention to legal aid work
- recent changes of legal service provision, again with
particular attention to legal aid work
- reasons for these changes and the impacts on firms
- changes in staff and resources
- readiness for specific changes occurring in the market and
wider changes in the market, again with particular attention to
legal aid work
- client services offered and how these are changing
- innovation within firms
- financial issues, eg the effects of alternative business
structures
The findings from this research will be used to produce a state
of the market report and to inform the on-going work of the three
sponsoring bodies.
The research will consist of three stages:
Stage 1
- evaluation of a draft questionnaire provided by MoJ, LSB and
LS, and definition of sampling strategy
- pre-pilot cognitive testing (to access understanding of the
questionnaire and to identify the burden on respondents in
answering the questionnaire)
- piloting of the survey
- analysis of any likely non-response bias in the survey. (This
is likely to include a short 'non-responder survey' among those
refusing to take part in the full survey)
Stage 2 (dependent on the outcome of stage
1)
- main stage fieldwork, 20 minute interviews with senior
representatives from 2,000 law firms across England and Wales
Stage 3
- analysis of survey results
- written report of survey results
- presentation of results
Stage 1 will include an assessment of whether the survey
methodology is likely to produce the required results. Stage 2 will
only be conducted if the outcome of the pilot indicates an
acceptable response rate, finds few issues around non-response
bias, as well as illustrating that a telephone survey (together
with any recommended method for changes to the process of data
collection) can provide the information required. If stage 1
suggests that it would not be possible to obtain the required
results or that a substantially different approach should be taken,
then the project will be stopped at this point and a new tendering
process would be initiated for any replacement project.
Expressions of interest from consortia of institutions (eg
joining expertise in legal services with social survey capacity and
expertise) are encouraged, although tenders from individual
institutions are also welcome. It is intended that the same
contractor be commissioned for stage 1 and stage 2. Bidders may
tender for all three stages, stages 1 and 2, or just stage 3.
Bidders should not tender for just stage 1 or just stage 2.
Bidders should state clearly which stage(s) of the project
they would be interested in bidding for.
The overall timetable for the research is for work to commence
in January 2012 and to be completed in July 2012.
Stage 1 is expected to take place mid January 2012 - mid March
2012
Stage 2 is expected to take place mid March 2012 - end May
2012
Stage 3 is expected to take place beginning Jun 2012 - end July
2012
The expected outputs for each stage are:
Stage 1
- a report on the results of the pre-pilot cognitive testing
- a note on the finalised pilot methodology. This should include
the proposed sample size, questionnaire for testing, and approach
to assessing feasibility of the full survey
- a report and presentation of the findings from the pilot
Stage 2
- before the main fieldwork is conducted, a revised questionnaire
for the main stage fieldwork
- regular updates on the progress of the survey fieldwork,
highlighting any potential problems
- when the fieldwork is completed, a fully anonymised SPSS
dataset which includes all survey data and all variables from the
sample file
- verbatim comments from respondents in Excel, with unique
identifier for each respondent, and with an auditable trail
illustrating coding of verbatim comments
- summary set of data tables in excel including full analysis by
sub-categories as appropriate and as agreed by MoJ, LSB and LS
Stage 3
- an outline of the methodology, framework, and content of the
report
- draft report
- final report, incorporating suggestions from MoJ, LSB and
LS
- the working SPSS dataset with any new derived variables, and
any other results used in the analysis eg worksheets, SPSS output
files
- two presentations of the final report, one to MoJ, LSB and LS
steering group, the other to policy representatives from MoJ, LSB
and LS
Evaluation of expressions of interest (essential
requirements)
Contractors meeting the evaluation criteria will be invited to
submit full tenders for the stage(s) of the project they are
interested in undertaking.
Expressions of interest will evaluated according to the
following criteria:
Stages 1 and 2
Evidence of survey methodology skills
- evidence of sample design skills
- evidence of questionnaire design skills
Evidence of expertise in conducting surveys
- evidence of expertise in conducting surveys among business
audiences, and also preferably providers of legal services
- evidence of expertise in tackling low response rates in surveys
among business audiences
- evidence of expertise in addressing non-response bias in
surveys involving business audiences
Expertise in developing, undertaking, and evaluating pilot
surveys
- evidence of ability to undertake cognitive testing of
questionnaires
- expertise in conducting pilot surveys
- expertise in evaluating pilot surveys
- capacity to evaluate pilot studies
Expertise in developing and capacity to undertake a large main
stage survey
- expertise in conducting large main stage surveys
- capacity to undertake a large main stage surveys
Stage 3
Expertise and capacity in data analysis of survey data and
report writing (for publication)
- evidence of analysis of businesses
- evidence of analysis of legal services
- expertise in statistical and econometric data analysis
- capacity to undertake data analysis
- expertise in report writing publishable reports
- capacity to undertake writing publishable reports
All stages
Strong project management skills and an ability to deliver to
deadlines
- evidence of project management skills
- track record of delivering to deadlines
How to submit expression of interest
To express interest in this project, please indicate how you
meet the essential requirements on no more than 2 sides of A4.
Please email your response (quoting EOI High Law Street
Firms Survey in the subject line) to: Keith.Blakemore@lawsociety.org.uk
Expressions of interest should arrive no later than
10.00 Monday 5 December 2011.
Potential contractors will notified whether they have invited to
submit a full tender, and provided with a full invitation to
tender, by Friday 16 December 2011. The deadline
for submission of tenders will be Thursday 5 January
2012.