According to a survey of 1,000 lawyers across the UK, law firms are primarily guilty of wasting reams of paper, despite years of claiming to be moving towards ‘paperless offices’. According to the researchers at Banner Business Services, 60 per cent of individual lawyers print more than 20 sheets of paper daily, most of which is not recycled.

Wasting paper

Additionally, nearly 18 per cent of lawyers do not engage in any recycling at their offices, even if they have the facilities to do so. And nearly 30 per cent of legal secretaries still fail to print on both sides of a sheet of paper.
On a positive note, the survey found that nearly 90 per cent of lawyers have recycling facilities available, but, commented Banner’s managing director, Richard Costin, ‘there’s still a low uptake of staff using them’.

Recycling champions

Mr Costin went on to point out that more than 60 per cent of lawyers claim to be in favour of having a ‘greener workplace’, but the problem is ‘they don’t practice what they preach’.
He said a possible solution was for law firms to appoint a ‘recycling champion’. Law firm partners, he said, ‘need to lead by example in order to convince staff of the environmental and cost saving benefits of printing on both sides of paper, recycling all paper goods and limited printing’.