BIRMINGHAM APPOINTMENT BOOSTS GATELEY LEGAL’S RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT TEAM

Gateley Legal has bolstered its specialist residential development team in Birmingham with the appointment of Thornton Allen as legal director. Allen joins from BPE Solicitors and brings extensive experience in assisting regional housebuilders and landowners with matters including acquisitions and plot sales. He has specialised in retirement living developments for more than 10 years and will help strengthen Gateley Legal’s later living offering to service the retirement homes sector.

He has also worked on collaboration and consortium agreements for large-scale schemes as well as strategic land matters. In addition, he has participated on the investment panel for the South West Regional Infrastructure Fund as one of two private sector members alongside local government, the regional development agency and Homes England. The investment panel oversaw the funding of major infrastructure projects required to facilitate or pump-prime residential development sites in the South West.

Commenting on his role, Allen said: “I’m delighted to be joining Gateley Legal. The size and depth of its residential development team is outstanding, and I’m looking forward to getting involved with the great schemes they work on.

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If you are wondering what to do with your old law books, please may I encourage you to consider donating them to the International Law Book Facility, asks Lord Justice Dingemans, Lead Judge for International Relations and a trustee of the ILBF.

It’s fantastic to be taking on a role where I can expand my knowledge and experience within the retirement living sector, as well as with residential housebuilders and developers.”

Callum Nuttall, partner and national head of the residential development team at Gateley Legal, said: “Thornton will make a great addition to our specialist residential development team in Birmingham. He brings with him a wealth of experience of the retirement living development sector which will be a great boost for our later living offering across the Midlands and beyond.

“Our impressive residential development team acts for 18 of the top 20 housebuilders in the UK, on either a regional or national level, and we are one of the few legal businesses in the country with a separate housebuilder team specialising in services for residential developers. In addition to this, we have created an ‘under one roof’ offering to service the latest needs of the UK property market.”

Gateley Legal’s national residential development team operates from offices located in Birmingham, Guildford, Leeds, London, Manchester, Newcastle upon Tyne, Nottingham and Reading, and includes 22 partners and 250 legal professionals.

The International Law Book Facility (ILBF) is a charity which provides good quality second-hand legal textbooks to universities, law schools, judiciaries and other not for profit legal organisations around the world.

The ILBF is primarily run by volunteers with a board of trustees. You can read more about the ILBF here.

New Recruit For Averta

Helen Hughes, a highly regarded employment lawyer and former legal director at Shakespeare Martineau LLP, has joined Averta Employment Lawyers as a senior consultant.

Hughes has considerable experience in the legal services industry, both in private practice and in house. She is also an accomplished Tribunal advocate.

Senior partner at Averta, Alan Jones said: “We are delighted that Helen has decided to join us as a consultant. I know Helen’s skills are second to none as she always works hard to get the best results, avoiding unnecessary conflict which is key to success in our business.”

Helen Hughes said: “I am very happy to have joined David and Alan and the team at Averta. I’m looking forward to using my skills in advising both senior employees and SMEs to resolve what are often complex legal disputes.”

Averta Employment Lawyers is an award winning, boutique employment law firm which was founded by ex DLA Piper partners, Alan Jones, and David Sykes. Averta specialises in giving advice to senior executives and professionals across both the private and public sectors. The firm have particular expertise in negotiating exit strategies and severance packages for directors and senior executives and also provides strategic employment law advice to companies across the UK.

The ILBF has a set of criteria to determine which publications are acceptable, and maintains a list of approved titles on its website. The books should be in good condition, and not torn or marked please.

Information on how to donate can be found here.

Anthony Collins Solicitors First Midlands Law Firm To Become A B Corp

the company is held to the highest standards of social and environmental performance, public transparency and legal accountability. Companies are evaluated on how their business success is measured, shifting the focus more to people and the planet as well as profit, and ACS is just the fourth law firm in the UK to achieve the accreditation.

There are only 1,000 B Corp organisations in the UK and 6,000 businesses worldwide making up the B Corp community, including global brands such as Innocent, Patagonia, Charity Bank and The Body Shop.

our positive social impact on society and the environment as a business. Becoming a B Corp is a natural development to our ongoing commitment to being a force for good alongside our clients.

“We have worked with B Lab, the body that certifies B Corps, over the last year to become a part of this community through a very rigorous application process. Each company is marked against the criteria and must achieve an 80-point benchmark as the first step, before being assessed on key areas including governance, workforce, community, the environment and customers.”

Anthony Collins Solicitors (ACS) has become the first law firm in the Midlands to achieve B Corp status, recognising the social purpose and environmental values of the company.

ACS is a social purpose law firm, and works with the social housing, health and social care, local government and charities sectors, as well as private individuals. It has more than 350 employees and offices across the Midlands and North West.

Being certified as a B Corp means

Each company’s business model, operations and structure are rigorously assessed to ensure they demonstrate high social and environmental values, and must provide a legal commitment to changing governance structures and be transparent on their performance.

Peter Hubbard, senior partner at Anthony Collins Solicitors, said:

“ACS’ values focus on improving lives, communities and society and this is now ingrained in the firm’s DNA. Clients, staff and stakeholders can rely on our B Corp status as evidence of

ACS publishes a Social Impact Report each year revealing the scale and impact of its social-purpose-driven legal work. Last year it supported 139 new charities to become registered, supported funding projects worth £850m to build approximately 4,750 new affordable homes and managed over £79m worth of assets for vulnerable individuals through Deputyship and Attorneyship work.

To read more about Anthony Collins Solicitors’ social impact, click here.

Birmingham Set To Have One Of The Fastest Growing Economies

in terms of employment with this study predicting that headcount will stand at 613,800 at the end of next year. This would equate to a year-on-year increase of 1.4%.

Birmingham’s strong performance by the end of next year contrasts with other locations in the West Midlands. Coventry, for example is expected to see annual GVA growth of just 0.5%, whilst Wolverhampton’s economy is expected to grow by 0.1%.

The report states that Birmingham’s large retail and hospitality sector will be negatively impacted by the cost-ofliving crisis in 2022 and 2023, however, other sectors in Birmingham such as creative and digital technologies are expected to drive growth.

Birmingham is set to have one of the fastest growing economies when the UK emerges from its recession in the second half of 2023, according to a new study by law firm Irwin Mitchell.

The Irwin Mitchell City Tracker has been produced by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr) and examines 50 locations across the UK, forecasting future growth in terms of GVA* and employment.

The report, which estimates that the UK entered into a recession in the second half of 2022, expects economic growth to resume in the second half of 2023.

According to the research, Birmingham’s economy is expected to see its GVA grow year-on-year by 1.1% in Q4 2023, rising to £29.6 billion.

In addition to having the fastest-growing economy anywhere in the Midlands, Birmingham also performed strongly

Charlotte Rees-John, partner and head of Irwin Mitchell’s Consumer sector, said: “Last year presented numerous challenges... the consumer sector has however been one of the most resilient, agile and innovative sectors in recent times and those businesses that succeed during 2023 will be in a very strong position to take advantage of a more stable economic environment in 2024.”