Its international practice largely relies on relationships with local law firms in other countries, many of which themselves have minimal overseas presence, and thus do not compete with Slaughter and May.

These closely associated firms have included Clayton Utz, Corrs Chambers Westgarth and Gilbert + Tobin in Australia;[10] Bell Gully in New Zealand; BonelliErede, Bredin Prat, De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, Hengeler Mueller and Uría Menéndez in continental Europe;[11] Shin & Kim and Kim & Chang in South Korea; and three of the Big Four law firms in Japan.

[citation needed] In May 2018, a report by a joint inquiry of members of the UK parliament criticized the firm for billing more than £8 million for legal advice to Carillion from when its dire financial position became clear in May 2017 to its eventual collapse in January 2018.

The report added that "by the end, a whole suite of advisers, including an array of law firms, were squeezing fee income out of what remained of the company.

Rachel Reeves, the Labour MP who chaired the Commons business committee, said that after the accountancy firms "it was Carillion's legal advisers who took the big payouts in the company's dying days".