Freshfields is the latest City firm to hive off staff from expensive London offices to cheaper digs in elsewhere in the country.

The firm has asked Knight Frank to find it 100,000 square feet in Manchester with a view to relocating the majority of its UK support staff. Those who are unwilling to move from London / accept massive pay cuts / pull their children out of school / sell their houses etc. will lose their jobs and be replaced by cheaper, more pliable northerners.

Consultations are under way so it's not known how many staff will be hit. Insiders say that firm hopes to get the office underway by late 2015, and that low level legal work will also be undertaken there - so it's good news for the Manchester paralegal community at least.

Apparently so.

None of Freshfields' partners will be moving, of course. Even with HS2 it will be just too much of a hike to the Royal Opera House and weekend houses in the Cotswolds. But once the redundancy programme has been paid for they should see an improvement in their annual drawings (currently averaging just £1.48m). Allen & Overy has already seen the cost benefits of undertaking a similar exercise in Belfast - a move which helped it to cut staff costs in 2013/14 by £15m.

A spokesman for the firm refused to comment.