That an industrial award regulates the employment of highly educated, well-paid fledgling lawyers says a lot about the over-regulation of the Australian workplace. This is the initial takeout from the underpayment scandal that has now hit the legal industry. The culture of long working hours for recently graduated young lawyers is the norm across leading law firms. But this has now run foul of the same complicated workplace laws that have contributed to other employers paying annualised salaries that turn out to be below award rates when actual hours worked are factored in.

Graduate lawyers: long hours are an investment in professional development.

Graduate lawyers are already paid well above the award minimum of $51,000, earning around $80,000 in top-tier firms and $60,000 to $65,000 mid-term firms. But from March, the Fair Work Commission will force law firms to keep time sheets and conduct annual pay reconciliations to ensure that junior staff are paid what they are entitled to under the award.

The justification for the micro-regulation of graduate lawyers' pay is to stop “exploitation” through excessive hours. Even on $80,000, a graduate lawyer working long hours might earn less per hour than a supermarket shelf stacker. But the comparison is false. Getting onto the first rung of the professional ladder at a prestigious law firm is not a dead-end job. Graduate lawyers' total "package" really includes the career-building professional training and experience received, plus the networking and job opportunities that arise, all of which is part of the trade-off for the long hours.

Long hours are an investment in professional development, especially when some big cases and deals can be career-making.

It is impractical to expect law firms to operate on a 9-to-5 basis. Long hours are often dictated by the needs of clients, and may even require pulling all-nighters or sleeping in the office when a big case or big deal is under way. Mission-creeping occupational health regulators who say overwork is a fatigue-related safety issue misunderstand why professional training is so gruelling. Junior doctors work long hours because they need to see lots of cases to learn to accurately diagnose illnesses. Junior lawyers also need to hone their legal skills under stress and pressure and still get things right. Long hours are therefore an investment in professional development, especially when some big cases and deals can be career-making.

The new rules may lift the cost base of law firms but are unlikely to change the culture of long hours, which is driven not by greedy exploitation but by professional need. It’s also absurd to think junior lawyers need to be protected from the hard work that leads to partnerships and senior partnerships, or is the pathway to the top ranks of the legal or commercial world. This is why competition for places in demanding graduate programs is so fierce. It may be that more law graduates want more balance between work and life, and that some might opt for alternative careers. If this trend costs law firms the top talent, then their cultures may need to adapt. But this should be sorted out in the competitive employment market – not by archaic industrial regulation of white-collar work.