Deacon or Duckin’ For Cover? Partners Deliver Coup de Grâce to Sacked Graduates

In the wake of the unceremonious axing of over half of the Deacons Melbourne office Articled Clerks, questions emerged

as to whether the ACs would have their admission paid for by the partnership.

The Articles of Clerkship finishes for the newly redundant ACs on March 2, whereas the slated admission date is mid-April. This hiatus of time exacerbated concerns in ACs already brought forth by their sacking, that they may be placed in the even more unfavourable position of needing to pay for their admission out of their own hip-pocket.

Rather than affording ACs a grace period between the end of Articles and the admission date, the partners:

‘Took us aside individually and said that we wouldn’t be kept on past the date on which Articles actually finishes, not up until admission. It is hard to believe the partners cant afford for us to stay another six weeks.’

The open questions being asked as to whether the Deacons partnership would at least have the heart to pay for the admission costs of the departing ACs have now been answered. An emphatic ‘no’ was delivered by HR today. Somehow, the relevant Deacons ACs will now have to find over $1OOO to gain admission to practise. On their own.