The Solicitors Regulation Authority is to consult on whether to continue to set minimum pay rates for trainees.

Current minimum salary levels for solicitors are £18,590 in central London and £16,650 outside, and have been frozen for the past two years. However the SRA board decided at its meeting today to revisit the whole issue.

The wage policy, which dates back to 1982, was designed to protect trainees from being exploited and encourage a high calibre of graduates to the profession.

But there is no remit in the Legal Services Act for the SRA to set minimum wage levels and the consultation will ask whether this policy should now be dropped.

The SRA’s executive director Samantha Barrass said: ‘We do not regulate prices, including rate of pay, in any other area of our work.

‘We have compared the practice with other professional regulators and found very few examples where this occurs. It would appear that setting a minimum salary does not address any identified risk to the public interest or the rule of law, nor is it clear that it improves access to the profession.’

The board will spend the next four months consulting with the profession and holding focus groups with stakeholders before considering any changes.

A decision on whether to remove the minimum salary requirement is likely to be made at the SRA board meeting on 16 May.

The consultation paper can be viewed and downloaded at the website from this Friday.