Foot Anstey

Adam focuses on advising private equity backed portfolio businesses with a particular specialism in bolt on acquisitions and implementing buy and build strategies. He is an important member of the transactional and integration team for key client businesses backed by Livingbridge, August Equity, Epiris, ICG and BGF. He regularly advises businesses at different stages of their life, from start ups seeking SEIS/EIS funding and angel investment through to M&A for PE portfolios.

Alan Hughes

Alan is head of the firm’s Retail Financial Services sector and provides regulatory and commercial advice to a diverse range of clients including financial advisers, investment managers, platforms, insurance brokers, credit providers and brokers and Islamic banks. Alan is proud to have built a cross-disciplinary team which collaborates and uses its deep sector knowledge to ensure that our clients always receive focused sector-specific advice – enabling our clients to achieve their goals whilst managing their regulatory risk effectively.

Alex McKnight

Alex McKnight deals with all aspects of clinical negligence litigation but has particular expertise in birth injury cases, amputation cases, and cases relating to infection, including necrotising fasciitis. He has an impressive case load of very high value cases £10 million plus and is one of our up-and-coming leaders in the field of child brain injury. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/alex-mcknight/

Alexandra Hammond

Alexandra specialises in advising clients who operate in the retail and consumer sector on contract and consumer law. Her extensive in-house experience means she understands the demands that stakeholders can put on an in-house legal function and how to manage expectations and prioritise tasks based on business risk and strategic importance. Always looking to achieve clients’ goals whilst working collaboratively in a positive environment, she takes the time to understand each client’s needs and mirrors their culture and ethos in her communication style in order to become an extension of their team. Alexandra also acts as interim General Counsel for key clients, predominantly in the retail and leisure sector, whilst they source a more permanent solution. These roles mean she works directly with each business’ key stakeholders and helps to manage business risks whilst supporting new projects, which drive growth and revenue for these organisations.

Alexandra Rogers

Alexandra specialises in resolving disputes about inheritance and trusts for individuals, charities and corporate trustees. She seeks to identify clients’ objectives early on and then works with them to design a strategy to achieve or even exceed those objectives. Much of Alexandra’s work involves untangling multiple issues, identifying problems that require resolution with other parties and offering practical solutions. Alexandra finds it rewarding to support clients during a difficult episode in their lives and to secure their desired outcome. Alexandra works closely with her colleagues in our UK and International Tax and Trusts teams, Agriculture team and Mental Capacity team, drawing on their complementary experience to provide a seamless service to clients.

Aliki Zeri

Aliki is a Senior Associate in our Energy, Projects, Infrastructure & Construction team. She is a dual-qualified lawyer (Greece, England and Wales). Aliki spent three years as the General Counsel of WElink Energy Europe, focussing on the development, construction, financing and refinancing of large scale, unsubsidized solar pv projects in Europe. She has significant experience in advising clients on the acquisition, development and disposal of renewable energy assets, including onshore wind turbines and has produced a number of articles on a variety of environmental law matters.

Andrew Mackie

Andrew is a Managing Associate at the firm and has over 14 years’ experience in advising charities and other not-for-profits on governance and regulatory matters. He deals extensively with the formation and registration of corporate charities, charitable trusts and other community-focused structures, and advises their governing bodies on their duties, roles and responsibilities. He regularly carries out constitutional and governance reviews, and provides training to trustees at all levels. Andrew has acted on several charity mergers and has assisted with the charity law aspects of several charity acquisitions. He also advises on contracts between charities and commercial entities, charity fundraising and trading and intellectual property matters. Andrew acts for charities and not-for-profits of all sizes and forms, including companies limited by guarantee, charitable incorporated organisations (CIOs), charitable trusts, Royal Charter bodies and statutory corporations. He has particular experience with arts organisations, armed forces charities and charities in the healthcare sector. Andrew is a former trustee and chairman of the London Philharmonic Choir, as part of which he sang first tenor for many years. In his spare time, he enjoys travel, theatre and music.

Angharad Davies

Angharad’s work focuses on employment tribunals (particularly respondent work) and has particular experience of defending disability, race and age discrimination claims, for clients in the public and private sectors. Angharad has also worked with the team to successfully resolve a multi-million pound TUPE information and consultation claim. Angharad frequently provides corporate support (including private equity) and advises a range of clients from a variety of industry sectors on contentious and non-contentious matters across a wide range of employment issues. This includes advising on disciplinary and grievance procedures, redundancies and drafting a number of employment documents such as Director’s Service Agreements and Settlement Agreements. She takes the time to understand her client’s business to ensure that the advice given is tailored accordingly and is practical and proportionate to what they are seeking to achieve.

Anna Phillips

Anna leads the firm’s charity property practice which advises charities, social enterprises, RP’s and healthcare organisations in solving property related problems including title issues, freehold disputes, commercial and residential landlord and tenant disputes, business leases renewals and property related professional negligence. Anna is passionate about the not-for-profit sector and is driven by making a positive difference to the organisations she represents. Anna also applies her deep subject matter expertise in solving complex property issues to assist the firm’s receivership clients. Anna approaches her work with clients as a partnership – working closely with them and other parties involved to get the right result. Often this means ensuring that property problems are resolved in an efficient manner so that funds are received more quickly or at a higher level of recovery.

Anna Parker

Anna is a partner in our Private Wealth and HNWI team. She provides tax and estate planning advice to individuals, including entrepreneurs, land owners, farmers or the independently wealthy. Her key focus includes the drawing together of a family’s private client and tax requirements, which involves the drafting of tax and succession advice, trusts, wills and LPAs, and any other documentation that they require. In addition, she also helps clients with cross border wills and probate and the acquisition of French real estate. Anna’s main interest is tax planning, and she says that she enjoys understanding clients’ circumstances and helping them to find ways to protect, preserve and ultimately pass on their patrimony in the most tax efficient manner possible. A particular career highlight involved Anna advising three generations of a family on succession for their property business, including tax advice, Wills, LPAs, shareholder’s agreement and two separate probates.

Annalisa Checchi

Annalisa provides advice to a variety of businesses on a broad range of legal and business affairs including drafting, negotiating and completing a wide range of commercial agreements. She has a special interest in intellectual property and technology. Annalisa fully understands the challenges her clients face and she strives to help them overcome these. She is able to draw on significant in-house experience from her previous roles, in particular her last in-house role where she provided support to a variety of marketing and advertising agencies for a US publicly listed group of companies. This experience gives her excellent commercial awareness, an understanding of how clients approach risk mitigation and an ability to deliver legal advice in her clients’ language.

Ashley Avery

Ashley is an expert in advising clients on complex data privacy and confidentiality issues, brand protection and exploitation and software development and licensing matters. She has previously worked with a number of high-profile clients across the technology, pensions, retail and financial services sectors and was seconded to Ambassador Theatre Group and Deliveroo.

Ayah Snober

Ayah is a member of our Real Estate team specialising in Islamic Finance. She frequently acts on behalf of numerous shariah compliant banks on a range of transaction models and financing structures. Ayah has also acted for leading Islamic banks on the development of their commodity murabaha and diminishing musharakah residential financing products. She works closely with individual overseas investors, often from the Middle East, looking to invest into the UK real estate market using shariah compliant financing. Ayah’s career highlights also include acting on behalf of an overseas corporate investor on a group reorganisation and c. £31m residential portfolio refinance of 38 units involving multiple jurisdictions and advising an Islamic bank on the refinancing of three high value residential units with a combined value of c. £22m.

Aziz Deen

Aziz is a real estate specialist with a particular focus on Islamic finance transactions. He has acted for all of the major Islamic Banks operating in the UK in connection with senior, stretch senior and mezzanine debt structures, secured against commercial or high value residential property. He has assisted Islamic Banks with the preparation of suites of finance and security documents and helped with product development and advisory matters. He also acts for high-net-worth individuals and family offices on the acquisition, financing, equity release and disposal of real estate assets. He has also represented Foot Anstey internationally and has developed a client base from the Gulf states (particularly Qatar and Saudi Arabia). A passionate social activist, Aziz has been awarded for his social action work by the Faith and Belief Forum at the Houses of Parliament and has appeared on the BBC’s Question Time talking about racial and class issues. Aziz is the founder of the Legal Guides mentoring program run by The Association of Muslim lawyers which has matched over 400 mentors and mentees. Aziz is also heavily involved in promoting the Islamic Finance industry and has been involved in lobby efforts to level the playing field for Islamic Finance customers.

Becki Biscoe

Becki acts for commercial clients to resolve disputes in connection with their property portfolios and acquisitions. She has experience in acting for retailers, developers, local authorities and land-owners to resolve high value disputes about residential and commercial developments and landlord and tenant matters. Becki always aims to identify client objectives as soon as she is instructed and ensuring that all of her efforts are geared towards achieving, and often surpassing, that goal. Innovation is key to Becki’s approach and as a champion of the firm’s Innovation Hub she is always thinking creatively about how the firm can meet client needs through new technology, processes or approach.

Brian Hitchcock

Brian specialises in the procurement of complex construction and engineering projects across the road, energy, real estate and health sectors. He also has expertise in the Space and Ports sectors. He has particular expertise in advising on contracting strategy and dispute avoidance to enable clients to achieve the project outcomes they wish. He has many career highlights over the past 20 years, but recent examples include advising Great Ormond Street Hospital on its major Phase 4 redevelopment, advising Goonhilly Earth Station on the upgrade of its estate and acting as a strategic advisor for many of the region’s key highways and regeneration projects.

Carol Ward

Carol is a Senior Associate in our Private Client team who can advise individuals and families on strategic tax and succession planning through the generations. Carol has worked with estate owners, farmers and high net-worth clients throughout her career as a solicitor and has a keen understanding of their legal needs and how to help them achieve their goals. Carol regularly drafts Wills and Lasting Powers of Attorney for her clients and advises them on the creation of trusts, both during their lifetime and under their Wills. Carol’s knowledge of landed estate matters means she can help clients manage estates whether they are privately owned or in a trust. She can offer clients her experience of dealing with applications under the Variation of Trusts Act 1958 and the creation of a Heritage Maintenance Fund as part of long-term tax planning. Clients also seek Carol’s advice on all aspects of administering an estate, especially when dealing with complex issues and highly valuable or sentimentally important assets.

Carol Phillips

Carol is a partner in our Commercial Property team. She specialises in acquiring, managing and disposing of real estate whether through freehold or leasehold transactions, and supports retail clients with their property portfolios and helping them to plan for the future. Despite all of the challenges faced by retailers today Carol is a firm believer that the public will still want to be able to access compelling retail space in the future and we will never be content to only shop online. Having spent time in-house managing a large and diverse portfolio Carol empathises with the position that clients are in and uses this to tailor her advice. She also has extensive experience of managing teams to support clients as an extension of their in house function providing commercial legal advice that is focused on helping clients achieve their investment aims. Work highlights include supporting a number of clients through headquarter moves, and being part of the team that built our Real Estate Asset Management platform, which allows clients to access the up to date status of their real estate matters in real time.

Catherine Haugh

Catherine is highly experienced at resolving commercial disputes of all kinds, many of which are complex, high value and/or commercially sensitive. Her practice encompasses breach of contract claims, director/shareholder disputes, public procurement claims and negligence. She acts for corporate and individual clients in both the private and public sector, including utilities and logistics companies, local Government departments, retailers, individual shareholders/directors, technology companies and partnerships. Catherine has considerable experience of litigating in the various divisions of the High Court and the Court of Appeal, and also regularly acts for clients in arbitrations and mediations. Catherine recognises that no two disputes are the same, and she works with her clients to understand their commercial objectives and then build a strategy designed to achieve those objectives as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible.

Celine Lecomte

Celine had over 18 years’ experience advising on trust administration, taxation of trust, restructuring and winding up in the UK. Her main area of work includes advising trustees and beneficiaries, managing a variety of family, personal injury, grant making charitable and employee benefits trusts.

Ceri-Ann Taylor

Ceri-Ann Taylor is a Legal Director in the Bristol Clinical Negligence Enable Law team. She has 17 years post qualification experience and is a member of the Law Society's Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme. Ceri's main specialism lies in delay in diagnosis of cancer cases, acting for patients who are facing a difficult diagnosis, or acting for bereaved families. Ceri also has a growing reputation for acting for patients who have experienced negligent over-prescribing of Tramadol, a dangerous and highly addictive opiate when not prescribed/consumed sensibly. Ceri also specialises in a wide range of other cases particularly spinal injury, and gynaecological cases. She is previously a Trustee of Compass Disability and continues to work closely with various charities who support her clients. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/ceri-ann-taylor/

Chantale Hooper

Chantale is an expert on banking and finance disputes, insolvency, debt recovery, contractual disputes, Enforcement of Judgment and regulatory matters and claims, including consumer credit claims. Committed to achieving the best result that is commercially satisfactory to the client, she says that she always gives the client options along with her recommendation on the best way forward. Outside of work Chantale enjoys dancing, being involved in the PTA at her children’s school, as well as walking the dog!

Charlene Nelson

Charlene is a Chartered Trade Mark Attorney in our Intellectual Property team with over 10 years’ experience in the field. She assists clients in navigating through the complexities of trade mark and design right registration procedures around the world. In particular, she helps clients obtain a balanced and cost-effective portfolio of rights to enable them to support their strategic and commercial objectives and place them in the best position to avoid and resolve disputes quickly. Further, she regularly conducts clearance searches in the UK and elsewhere to ensure that new brands are free to use. Over the years, she has worked with a variety of different sized clients across different sectors and enjoys getting to know clients and understanding their businesses in order to provide targeted and bespoke advice. Charlene is an active member of ECTA and represents the UK on the Publications Committee.

Charlotte Morgan

Charlotte Morgan is a Managing Associate working out of our Taunton office. She focuses on catastrophic injury cases and is not afraid of thinking outside the box to find ways to support her clients and provide them with support and advice. An excellent litigator she has been recognised by clients and colleagues alike for her tenacious approach and innovative thinking. Charlotte is a passionate road safety advocate and has strong links with charity RoadPeace that supports the victims of road traffic incidents. Throughout her career she has developed relationships with Family Liaison Officers as well as Accident Reconstruction Experts that she advices with to support her clients. She often represents clients at inquests and has a lot of experience bringing claims following fatal accidents. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/charlotte-morgan/

Christian Silk

Christian is a Partner working in the energy and infrastructure sector and heads our Planning and Environment Team. He advises clients involved in energy transition to zero and low carbon technologies and on environmental and climate change issues and opportunities. Christian also works with clients across the developer, private equity, ports and space & satellite sectors on a full range of planning, environment and infrastructure consenting and associated matters. Christian brings to this work his specialist knowledge as a chartered town planner which can be invaluable to clients in a number of situations.

Claire Holland

Claire is an employment partner with significant experience advising large national and international companies having worked for a large international law firm for over 10 years. Working closely with clients to understand their aims and objectives, Claire provides commercial and practical advice, helping clients to manage the employment aspects of complex transactions and internal restructuring exercises, as well as advising on the TUPE implications of business transfers and outsourcing arrangements. Claire is recognised for her responsiveness and down-to-earth approach and her ability to cut through complex areas of law to provide clear and straightforward advice. Claire also plays a lead role in the firm’s Financial Services Sector, with particular expertise advising Private Equity backed portfolio companies and Retail Financial Services’ clients, regularly advising on board level employment and strategic issues, such as senior exits and integration projects. A highlight for Claire was working on Ensono’s $405 million international acquisition of Wipro’s Hosted Data Center Services business. Claire advised on the employment implications of the stock and asset deal in the UK, including advising on the TUPE information and consultation process, as well as project managing the employment advice across eight jurisdictions.

Claire Stoneman

Claire Stoneman is a consultant at the firm's Taunton office and was previously a partner with the firm. She specialises in birth injury claims leading to either cerebral palsy, stillbirth or neonatal death. She has been a member and supporter of the Stillbirth & Neonatal Death Society (Sands) and their local Groups along with several birth injury and baby loss charities for many years. She has developed a specialised practice and team which are particularly focused on acting for and supporting brain injured children and adults and bereaved parents following obstetric, neonatal and paediatric care (having commenced her career representing families at the Bristol Royal Infirmary Public Inquiry into paediatric cardiac surgery). Claire set up the firm's Corporate Partnership with Group B Streptococcus Support and Cerebra which focus on maternity/obstetric care and child brain injury respectively. She also works closely with the charities Aching Arms, Daddy's with Angels and Headway Somerset. Claire is a member of the Law Society's Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme and Action Against Medical Accidents (AvMA) Specialist Clinical Negligence Panel. She is also a Trustee and Vice Chair of Headway Somerset. Claire Stoneman - Partner | Enable Law

Claire Leslie

Claire Leslie is a Legal Director with significant experience supporting women that have suffered injuries during their pregnancy or whilst giving birth. She manages the firm's relationship with MASIC, a charity specialising in supporting women with OASI injuries. In addition to that she manages the firm's relationship with Shine, the UKs specialist charity supporting children with spina bifida and hydrocephalus. Her easy going and caring nature means she can build connections of trust with clients that have suffered significant injury and whose long-term impact is of a personal and sensitive nature. In addition, she has a strong practise acting for families who children sustain catastrophic injuries arising out of birth.

Daniel Isaac

Dan Isaacs is a Legal Director at Enable Law with significant experience in dealing with claims of maximum severity and birth injury claims. He has an expertise in these cases which experts and counsel comment on but remains committed to ensuring the clients are fully informed and engaged through their claim. He regularly acts on behalf of Personal Representatives in connection with fatal accident cases. Dan Isaac - Senior Associate | Enable Law

Danielle Spalding

Danielle’s practice is focused on the agricultural and rural business sector. She works on rural business and agricultural disputes such as partnership disputes, landlord and tenant claims, issues relating to restrictive covenants, proprietary estoppel claims and a range of Agricultural Holdings Act matters. She also advises landowners on the Electronic Communications Code. Danielle acts for a wide range of rural clients including landowners, landed estates and others with an interest in the rural land market such as major banks and property developers. Danielle has a thorough understanding of the rural market that her clients operate in enabling her to offer practical solutions that work. A highlight in her career to date has been using this insight in one of the first test cases to go through the Tribunal after the introduction of the new Electronic Communications Code in 2017.

Dickon Court

Dickon is a dispute resolution solicitor who leads major disputes and dispute avoidance processes for national and international clients. His focus is on resolving disputes arising out of significant energy, infrastructure and construction projects. Dickon’s 14 years of experience includes both high value commercial disputes and disputes in construction and engineering. That experience allows him to advise on a wide variety of issues that might arise on a project – from advising on potential issues at the outset; through assisting with management of the project and resolving problems as they arise; to project threatening disputes and final resolution of major litigation. Alongside construction/engineering issues Dickon has strong experience advising on professional negligence and fraud recovery. Dickon frequently advises on contractual points on commercial and bespoke contracts as well as on standard forms including FIDIC, NEC, JCT, IChemE and IET. Dickon runs disputes though ADR, adjudication, the courts and arbitration. Dickon specialises in disputes in the energy sector and in particular battery storage and solar projects. Dickon has been involved in a number of the early disputes in the battery storage space, which to date have included financing issues and catastrophic failure as well as delay and availability problems.

Douglas Smith

Douglas is our Technical Tax and Trust Counsel with over 30 years’ experience in estates, tax and trusts law. He joined Foot Anstey from Thrings in April 2020, having previously been a partner at Blake Morgan for most of his career. Qualifying initially as a barrister and subsequently re-qualifying as a solicitor, Douglas has considerable experience at advising on how to make the most of available tax reliefs and trust structures when dealing with property, business shares and other assets. His clients appreciate his clear and sensible advice on questions around stamp taxes, capital gains tax, inheritance tax and many other aspects of the UK’s taxation regime as they relate to the purchase, sale or gifting of assets. Douglas has administered a number of highly complicated estates, including those with assets in multiple jurisdictions, and is well placed to support families with a deceased relative’s affairs. With a special interest in heritage property, Douglas is also highly knowledgeable of the law in this niche area. Clients regularly seek his counsel on how to manage heritage assets and benefit in particular from his experience of dealing with HMRC’s heritage property team. Douglas also has experience in drafting prepaid funeral plan trusts for funeral directors who wish to establish funeral plan businesses and ensuring that the trust provisions are consistent with the plan agreement and that both documents are so far as possible drafted in the most tax efficient way. Douglas is also able to provide any additional advice that may subsequently be required in connection with the administration of the trust (including an application for membership of the Funeral Planning Authority) . Douglas also provides UK tax advice to clients who are resident and/or domiciled abroad (i.e. individuals, trustees of offshore trusts and person’s responsible for other offshore entities).

Duncan Sykes

Duncan is a Partner in the corporate team advising on M&A, investments, JVs and delivering exit and/or succession plans including by way of management buy-out. Duncan has particular experience of deals in the Energy and Developer sectors. He regularly acts on transactions with an international element, in particular with European, US and Canadian counter-parties. Duncan is driven by building long term relationships with clients to help them achieve their ultimate aspirations, frequently working with other advisers to create the client’s desired transaction. His collaborative approach ensures the best deal for the client is delivered in a cost effective way within the appropriate timescale.

Edward Venmore

Edward leads the firm’s farms, estates and rural land practice. He has extensive experience in a wide range of litigation including commercial litigation, professional negligence claims, property and regulatory-related disputes. He has acted for public bodies, institutional clients, companies, charities, landed estates, partnerships and private individuals. With the aim of giving high quality commercial advice, he carefully listens to the client’s aims and concerns at the outset and then develops a clear strategy to resolve the dispute they are dealing with.

Emily Botham

Emily is a specialist matrimonial and divorce lawyer who can advise clients on a variety of areas relating to family law. A Senior Associate in our Exeter office, Emily joined Foot Anstey in April 2020 from Ashfords. Clients approach Emily for her advice as it relates to the various stages of a relationship, including cohabitation issues for non-married couples, married couples that are considering a separation and what affect this may have on their situations, to couples that have separated and are seeking a divorce. In particular, she has over eight years’ experience in helping clients to separate finances and other assets, including property, businesses, pensions and trusts following a divorce. Clients also approach her for help with drafting and concluding pre-nuptial and post-nuptial agreements in which she advises on preserving their important assets, such as property, in the event of a future divorce. Emily also works with many clients who have children and want to make sure their best interests are protected during a divorce or separation. She can help parents resolve disagreements about a wide range of issues such as where a child should live and what time they should spend with a parent or carer. In addition, Emily has experience dealing with cross-border and inter-jurisdictional issues, for example where one parent lives or is moving abroad. She also advises grandparents and other family members who have an interest in a child’s wellbeing in this regard.

Emma Facey

Emma is a member of the firms Charity team and deals with a range of legacy matters. She advises charities on a range of legacy related matters. The majority of her work involves advising charities that have been left a gift in a will or trust and ensuring that the charity gets to use the money for its charitable purpose. She uses proactive, pragmatic thinking to unpick complicated scenarios to enable a release of cash allowing clients to fund their charitable objectives, such work relates to both legacy disputes and legacy administration. Emma also advises charities in relation to Will and Trust disputes and complex issues where the charity requires advice on its position as Executor/Trustee and/or Beneficiary. She also acts for charities as a legacy consultant undertaking legacy administration. She has gained invaluable experience working in-house on secondment with national charities as such Cancer Research UK, National Trust and Save the Children. This experience enables her to provide solution focused advice, based on her understanding of the issues at the heart of the organisation and the intricate connections between charity law, legacies and the importance of building and maintaining relationships with third parties. She oversees the day to day running of the legacy administration team at Foot Anstey. As the team has evolved and due to her in-house experience, Emma’s role also looks beyond the legal tasks associated with legacies and she is often called upon in an advisory capacity to provide support around accounting practices, risk management and procedures/processes for legacy teams. She has also carried out strategic reviews and audits which are tailored to client’s needs. Emma works closely with the firm’s dispute resolution, private wealth and mental capacity teams to provide a seamless service to clients. She is a member of the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners (STEP) and the Association of Contentious Trust and Probate Specialists (ACTAPS). She sits on the branch committee for STEP West of England (Chair) and is also a Non-Council Member Representative (Wales & West) on the England & Wales Regional Committee and the Chair. Emma has recently joined STEP’s Professional Development Committee.

Emma Earp

Emma is a Partner in the firm’s Banking and Finance team. Emma has over a decade’s worth of experience working with corporate borrowers and lenders on regional, national and international transactions. Emma trained and qualified into the Banking and Finance department of the leading City firm Travers Smith. She has experience in a wide range of finance transactions, including acquisition finance, property finance, project finance and general corporate lending. Emma is familiar with bank standard form documents and Loan Market Association documentation and regularly advises on security structures and intercreditor arrangements. Outside of work Emma is happiest at the beach – sailing, windsurfing, swimming all year round and doing yoga on a paddleboard. Emma has worked as a dinghy sailing instructor in Menorca and has Yachtmaster theory and Coastal Skipper qualifications.

Emma Clayton

Emma is a Senior Associate in the Corporate Team. She deals with a wide range of corporate work, including mergers and acquisitions. Emma’s focus is on advising private equity backed portfolio businesses, with a particular specialism in bolt on acquisitions and implementing buy and build strategies. She is also a practiced advisor to the financial services sector and the retail sector, having acted for institutional and investor clients on national and international deals in these industries.

Frances Wright

Frances Wright joined the firm in April 2023 and has over 25 years' experience acting for people who have suffered from medical negligence. She has been an AvMA panel solicitor for over 25 years and also holds Law Society accreditation. She deals with a range of cases, particularly those involving complex medical issues resulting from surgical errors and cancer diagnoses. She also has a well-established record of success in maximum severity claims, including those resulting from birth injury and sepsis. Frances is a Trustee (and former Chair of Trustees) for CP Plus, the Greater Bristol CP support charity. Frances Wright - Enable Law

Gary Walker

Gary Walker is a Partner leading the Enable Law Abuse team that sits within the wider personal injury team. He has over 15 years of experience acting for seriously injured clients who have suffered abuse and neglect in the workplace, a healthcare setting or when in care. He has both children and adult clients and is a panel member of the Association of Child Abuse Lawyers (one of only 15 in the country and the only panel member in the South-West). He regularly receives direct referrals from professionals in childcare, other personal injury lawyers and the Official Solicitor. Some of Gary's cases that have been on the public eye include representing clients in the Fuller Inquiry, clients that were inpatients at Edenfield, resident clients of Fullerton House as well as the now infamous Winterbourne View setting. Gary also advises clients on the developing law in data breach concentrating on acting for adoptive families. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/gary-walker/

Georgia Day

Georgia advises in all areas of family law including divorce and financial remedy proceedings as well as advising on private children matters, in particular around issues concerning residence and contact. She also advises clients on the breakdown of cohabiting relationships and in relation to pre and post nuptial agreements. Passionate about making a difference and providing a necessary service for people in difficult situations, Georgia is committed to adopting an understanding and empathetic approach to her work.

Georgina Massey

Georgina is a Managing Associate in the Affordable Housing Team and specialises in dealing with complex sites acting for registered providers with land and build, golden-brick and turn-key acquisitions, together with strategic land typically on a conditional on planning basis. Georgina is known for her proactive and straight-forward approach and working collaboratively with her clients and colleagues to provide a seamless service.

Gillian Clark

Gillian Clark is a partner based out of the Enable Law Bristol office and was previously heading the Clinical negligence and Personal Injury Teams at Ince. She joined the firm in April 2023 bringing with her all 14 members of her team and their clients. She is a very experienced litigator and has run a wide variety of cases but through the years has developed a particular interest in brain injury cases including injuries at birth, catastrophic stroke cases as well as meningitis cases, she also manages a number of spinal injury cases involving negligently performed spinal surgery. Gillian manages the firm's relationship with Meningitis Now as well as with several charities and support groups operating in the greater Bristol area including the Bristol Conductive Education Centre. Gillian is a gifted leader with a lot of enthusiasm that empowers her team to learn from each other and benefit from the firm's collective expertise to get the best results for clients. Gillian Clark - Enable Law

Hannah Batten

Hannah helps clients to make the most of their intellectual property (IP) rights and other IP related opportunities, by providing strategic advice on the ownership, protection and exploitation of IP rights. Hannah has particular expertise in drafting and negotiating IP licences, but also advises on a wide range of other non-contentious and transactional IP agreements and other matters. This includes assignments, collaborations, franchising and sponsorship arrangements, as well as IP issues arising in M&A, joint ventures and investments. She regularly advises on IP ownership within a corporate group structure, and has significant experience of advising charities on trade mark ownership and licensing arrangements. Hannah takes a very human approach to her advice, and has been described by her clients as ‘approachable’, ‘diligent’ and ‘tenacious’. She finds earning the trust and confidence of clients the most rewarding aspect of her work, as this leads to genuinely collaborative relationships and the ability to add real value through a deeper understanding of the wider circumstances and personalities (as well as the commercial priorities) involved in a particular situation or deal.

Helen Dickie

Helen has extensive experience in the full spectrum of real estate disputes, working for a range of commercial clients including institutional landlords, household-name occupational tenants, and developers. Helen has a particular focus on the retail sector, and extensive experience in telecoms, having spent five years immediately prior to joining Foot Anstey working in-house for two of the UK’s largest telecoms operators. During that time she had conduct of a significant portfolio of litigation, including the first appealed case under the Electronic Communications Code. Through both her private practice and in-house experience, Helen has experience in a range of Courts, including the Court of Appeal. Helen spent a number of years practicing in the City, and has conducted a number of reported cases, both at first instance and on appeal, including the largest reported residential enfranchisement case and a key case on landlord’s consent, as well as a significant number of recent telecoms cases. Helen is known for tenaciously pursuing commercial and practical solutions to disputes, and has had excellent results using mediation and ADR.

Huw Ponting

Huw Ponting is a Partner and Head of the Personal Injury Department. He has over 20 years of experience supporting clients who have suffered catastrophic injuries bring maximum severity claims. He is the Chair of Trustees Trustee at Headway Bristol and a Trustee at Headway Herefordshire. Huw has been instrumental in the setting up and running of several free legal clinics around the country supporting patients of Intensive Care and Brain Injury Units. His expertise lies in supporting clients who have suffered maximum severity injuries following an accident with a specialism in supporting clients with an acquired brain injury the effect of which impacts them for the rest of their lives. He also has over 20 years of experience acting as a Court of Protection appointed Deputy for many of his clients and works closely with the Enable Law CoP team to ensure that client needs continue to be met for the rest of their lifetime. Huw regularly provides training to Solicitors, Barristers, case managers and other professionals supporting clients following a serious injury. He has very strong links within the charity sector and is viewed as an expert figure within the brain injury legal field. Huw Ponting - Enable Law

Ian Stubbs

Ian is head of our projects, infrastructure and construction team. He specialises in transactional legal aspects of major national and international projects, their procurement, construction, delivery and operation, as well as their funding, sale and refinancing, supporting you at all stages of the lifecycle of a constructed asset. Prior to joining Foot Anstey, Ian was a partner at an international law firm and based in the City of London, where he headed up a team working on some of the UK’s largest construction, infrastructure and energy projects. With his extensive experience/expertise, Ian can provide you with strategic, commercially-astute advice on your contracting structures, finance and procurement methodology and can also support you on contract drafting and in negotiations, ensuring successful delivery of your projects and giving you the experience of having an expert not just advising you, but being a part of your team. Ian has over 35 years’ industry experience, including senior management and technical experience outside of the legal sector as a quantity surveyor and a contracts manager. Driven by this strong, industry-based operational understanding of contracting and delivery issues and a thorough understanding of the challenges that high-value, technically complex, long-term projects might present you with, Ian can listen to you and understand the issues you face and help you put those issues in the context of your legal and contractual responsibilities. Because Ian knows that the first step towards managing your risk is for you to understand it. Ian is proud to have been part of the team that was a finalist in the categories of Leadership and Pioneer at the 2018 British Renewable Energy Awards. He is also an externally recognised expert in his subject area, having spoken at conferences held by the European Construction Institute and by the Engineering & Construction Risk Institute, as well as at events organised by other industry professional bodies, such as the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.

Imam Qazi

Imam is a member of the real estate team and an Islamic finance specialist with considerable experience in dealing with a range of high-value and complex investment, finance and development transactions. An active participant in the Islamic Finance market for over 15 years, he has developed a broad Islamic Finance practice advising investors and financial institutions on a range of shariah compliant products and structures.

Jackie Linehan

Jackie Linehan is a Legal Director with more than 30 years' experience managing claims for compensation involving the NHS. Historically she managed many clinical negligence claims valued in excess of £10million on behalf of the NHS litigation authority and various Acute Trusts. This means Jackie is excellently placed to bring complex claims as she has a really good understanding of both sides of the litigation process having also acted as a defendant solicitor in the past. This year Jackie settled 2 brain injury cases for children with hidden disabilities for over £24 million each. She regularly receives instructions to take over child brain injury cases transferred from other less experienced solicitors. She is passionate about disability rights equality and authors a column for Cerebral Palsy Plus' quarterly publication inspiring members to dream big and pursue their goals. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/jackie-linehan/

James Barnett

James is a Legal Director in our Real Estate team. He has over 10 years’ experience and has significant expertise in advising clients on all aspects of asset management and investment work. Examples of his work include: Acted for Hammerson in respect of the management and development of its retail parks’ portfolio as well as advising on circa £400 million of disposals from the portfolio. Acted for Battersea Power Station Development Limited on the property and estate structuring of the Battersea Power Station development. Advised a landlord on the regearing (with ancillary works) of a US bank’s leasehold interest in an office building in Canary Wharf. Advised Aviva on its acquisition of a retail park in Crawley for circa £55 million.

James Gliddon

James is a partner in our dispute resolution team. A specialist in banking and financial services litigation, his work often centres on a range of customer-led disputes which generate reputational threat against a highly regulated backdrop. With a determined approach to achieving the best commercial outcome to disputes, alongside maintaining down to earth handling of sensitive matters such as mis-selling, fraud and SME disputes, he works on matters with industry-wide relevance. As the economic climate tightens, complex recoveries, insolvency related/led disputes and acting for receivers is, again, a growing area of work. As a consequence of his financial services sector focus, James has a naturally developed a practice and growing reputation in fraud (prevention, investigation and recoveries). This includes acting for victims, insolvency practitioners or the institutions seeking to protect their customers. He is the Chair of the South West Fraud Forum and also sits on the UK Fraud Forum. James delivers regular industry-focussed updates through the Lenders’ Litigation Forum and recent training sessions include considering the hot-topics of Quincecare and secret commissions in broker relationships.

Jessica Pitt

Jessica is Head of the firm’s Family Team and the Private Wealth Sector. She provides advice on the consequences of relationship breakdown for married and cohabiting couples, pre-nuptial agreements and wealth protection within a relationship context. Jessica is trained as a collaborative lawyer with a focus on alternative dispute resolution for families. Driven by the desire to solve problems and deliver solutions, particularly for those clients who may have complicated finances, she helps to deliver a fair settlement in an amicable divorce process. She also enjoys working with other professional advisors to provide a seamless service to mutual clients. Jessica joined Foot Anstey as a trainee and is proud to have undertaken her journey to Partner within the firm.

Joanne Boyle

Joanne is an employment lawyer specialising in providing practical strategic advice and dealing with complex employment tribunal litigation including unfair dismissal, discrimination and whistleblowing on behalf of large multisite clients. She also has a range of commercial experience, including transactional, strategic and day-to-day human resources support and has developed a niche for delivering management development training programmes in an innovative way. She advises on a wide range of both contentious and non-contentious matters including advising employers on issues such as complex organisational restructures, enforcement of restrictive covenants in the High Court, corporate support for all aspects of acquisitions and disposals including the effect of TUPE and regularly provides practical advice on redundancy programmes – always taking into account a client’s commercial considerations. Joanne also specialises in providing employment law support in the restructuring and insolvency sphere, working seamlessly with the wider team. Joanne is regularly called upon by a number of clients considering change management programmes including business reorganisations and bringing about cultural change. Joanne has delivered a number of cultural change programmes, including some around diversity and inclusion, to assist companies to get the best out of their talent and build a more sustainable workforce.

Joanne Rumley

Joanne leads our Restructuring and Insolvency offering collaborating with a broad range of businesses, directors, stakeholders and other professional advisors. Her role is focused on opportunities for turnaround rescue and restructure but also involves managing formal insolvency processes. She works closely with distressed equity and debt investors as well as with turnaround professionals and insolvency practitioners. Joanne is regularly found in the board room providing strategic advice to directors of businesses close to insolvency, particularly around their duties and responsibilities when dealing with distress. She also has significant experience advising stakeholders on managing their risk and exposure to businesses in financial difficulty. Joanne and her team are specialists in the investment bank special administration regime overseeing the return of significant values of client monies and custody assets across a portfolio of these cases. Joanne is proud of the Restructuring and Insolvency Team’s approach and says ‘we always try to be accessible, flexible, responsive and adaptable, seeking to deliver technical advice in a practical yet commercial way, with an ability to innovate and think creatively in order to deliver the best solutions for our clients’. Joanne enjoys contributing to the wider business communities in which she works and is a national director of TMA UK and the Insolvency Lawyers’ Association and more locally a board member of the West of England Local Enterprise Partnership. Joanne is also passionate about the importance of business inclusion and diversity and supports Foot Anstey’s work in this area.

John Catchpole

Real Estate John is a leading member of Foot Anstey LLP’s real estate team, delivering a broad range of high value, complex commercial property projects, with a particular focus on corporate real estate and large-scale development and infrastructure projects. Work highlights include: Acting for a local authority to acquire over 100 acres of land for a major mixed use “Garden Village” development of 3,500 new homes, shops, community facilities, schools, care homes, open space and a sports stadium. Acting for TClarke PLC in the relocation of their head office to the iconic Gherkin building in the City of London. Supporting Teignbridge District Council with the acquisition and long term management arrangements for over 100 acres of land designated as “Suitable Alternative Natural Green Space” to support the development of a large mixed use urban extension at South West Exeter. Leading the Foot Anstey team advising an international charity on the acquisition of land and development of a £110m education and leisure venue. Advising on the redevelopment of an historic airfield to create a mixed use creative arts and business hub. Space and Satellite John has a passion for space and leads Foot Anstey’s Space and Satellite team, supporting space and satellite sector businesses and organisations in both the upstream and the downstream segments. Work highlights include: Leading the Foot Anstey LLP team advising Spaceport Cornwall on the legal and regulatory framework for launch under the Space Industry Act 2018, delivering guidance on state aid, legal structures, planning and environmental, property and infrastructure and health & safety, in preparation for the first sovereign launch of spacecraft from UK soil in 2022. Supporting an Argentinian space tech business set up their new operations and expansion into the UK. Client relationship partner for AeroSpace Cornwall, working with the wider Foot Anstey Space and Satellite team to support over 36 space and aerospace businesses with bespoke IP, data, commercial, corporate, real estate, infrastructure and employment advice. Contributing to the West of England Space Strategy. A member of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Data and Space Industry Advisory Group.

Karen Bates

Karen is a member of the Firm’s Management Board and is responsible for the leadership of a team of over 45 lawyers within the Firm’s commercial and employment teams. Karen has been particularly involved in developing the firm’s employment, pensions and business immigration team as a team of advisory specialists within the business group. Karen’s approach is to think about the bigger picture and advise clients on the best way to achieve their goals. Her main experience lies in complex people strategy and HR risk management as well as bespoke advice on the full range of people issues arising in business. This ranges from large scale restructuring and redundancy, TUPE, transactions and workforce integration and high value employment litigation. Karen also often advises clients’ boards on a broad spectrum of business issues.

Karl Bradford

Karl is experienced in a range of corporate commercial transactions with particular experience in joint ventures and the structuring, establishment and running of private investment funds. Karl’s secondments at international asset management and real estate companies have given him valuable insight into the requirements of our clients, streamlining transactions and anticipating potential pinch points.

Kate Lucas

Kate is a Senior Associate in the Farms, Estates and Rural Land team. She acts for clients on a wide range of rural land transactions, including farm and land sales and purchases, refinances, landed estate management, first registrations, farm business tenancies and Agricultural Holding Act tenancies, sporting rights and high-value rural residential property transactions. Kate has been with the firm since she was a trainee solicitor and regularly works for high net worth individuals, landowners and landed estates. Kate’s farming background means she has an understanding, from her personal experience, of how rural clients’ businesses work and the matters important to them in transactions.

Kate Dawe

Kate is a Managing Associate at the firm and has extensive experience in advising clients on a broad spectrum of commercial property matters, including investment transactions, landlord and tenant work, and property financing. In addition, Kate has particular expertise in commercial development projects, acting for developers, funders, landowners and tenants in relation to developments in sectors as diverse as leisure, retail and logistics to student accommodation and airports. Kate has acted for a number of large funds and investment managers in relation to purchases, forward-fundings, lettings and sales.

Kate Heard

Kate is a senior associate in our Islamic finance practice and has experience in working on a wide variety of real estate-driven banking and finance transactions and multi-tranche development transactions encompassing a wide range of Islamic financing arrangements. She is named in the Legal 500 2023 as a Key Lawyer in Islamic finance in London and described by clients as ‘ very approachable, responsive and knowledgeable.’ Kate advises shariah compliant banks in single property and portfolio acquisitions and refinancing transactions involving commercial and residential assets, often with an offshore element. An example of Kate’s work includes advising Riyad Bank (London Branch) on their single largest real estate financing transaction to date: a £64m shariah-compatible facility used to refinance the UK HQ of an international law firm in Moorgate.

Kate New

Kate is a Partner in our Real Estate Disputes team at Foot Anstey. She has extensive experience across various sectors including retail, telecoms and developers. Kate finds commercial solutions to all manner of disputes concerning clients real estate. She has expertise in telecoms litigation having worked on the key leading test cases. Kate also has considerable experience working on a broad variety of disputes where clients need solutions that will often involve the use of alternative dispute resolution (ADR). Kate also has extensive experience in a range of courts including the Supreme Court. Kate has a broad range of experience in both private practice and the corporate world following two years in-house at a leading telecoms operator. Kate is dedicated to mitigating the challenges and securing opportunities for businesses within the telecoms space through strategic solutions. She has a particular interest in portfolio work for real estate clients, where solutions need to be tailored to consider not just the subject property but also how it impacts their broader real estate needs.

Katherine Moyse

Katherine Moyse is a Managing Associate with over 13 years of experience supporting clients following catastrophic injuries. Katherine spent the first 10 years of her career representing victims of clinical negligence. She was accredited as a member of the Law Society's specialist Clinical Negligence Panel in 2014, at just 4 years PQE. This early appointment recognised her experience running complex and high value litigated cases. Most of her experience was representing clients who had suffered brain and/or spinal cord injuries, serious orthopaedic injuries including amputations and significant psychiatric injuries. She has transferred her skills, experience and expertise from this time to her personal injury practice, alongside her keen interest in these injury types. She is focused on maximising outcomes through early access to rehabilitation and can quickly build strong relationships with clients and others, centred on trust and confidence. She is a Trustee of Headway Bath and jointly leads the team's relationship with The Limbless Association. Katherine Moyse - Enable Law

Katie Taylor

Kate is a member of our commercial real estate team and acts for both owners and occupiers across all aspects of acquisition, disposal and management of retail, office and industrial space. She has considerable experience in acting for investor landlords with large property portfolios in the retail and leisure sector. Always looking for ways to provide innovate solutions for clients, Kate has recently worked with a major retail client to improve and streamline our workflow with them. By having a full understanding of the particular need of the client, she was able to think creatively to deliver a legal solution that works for them.

Katie-Jane Rees

Katie has spent just under 15 years in the City, gaining experience working on high value lending transactions, acting for UK and international syndicates of banks on a secured and unsecured basis, as well as advising corporate borrowers – whether on general financings or in restructuring situations. She has particular experience in the Nordic region, acting for a number of Nordic banks over the past decade. Katie has also built a practice advising corporate service providers on non-bank lendings, advising facility and security agents and also trustees across a range of capital markets and structured finance products. Katie has a commercial and personable approach and has been listed as a rising star by Legal Business.

Kee Evans

Kee is a Principal Director in our Planning and Environment team. She has over 15 years’ experience acting for both public and private sector clients including several major housebuilders, utilities, banks and blue-chip companies. She has expertise in advising on all aspects of planning, highways, compulsory purchase and environmental law. Kee has worked extensively in the renewables and transport sectors advising clients on consents and permissions required for energy and infrastructure projects, managing planning appeals and issues of environmental liability. Kee also advises on commercial redevelopment and housing matters. Outside of work Kee enjoys travelling, dancing and listening to live music.

Ken Lewins

Working across sectors and using his wide transactional experience Ken provides advisory support with clear, commercial and pragmatic advice to businesses and founders on shareholder arrangements, investments, restructurings, UK and cross border joint ventures, along with acquisitions, buy and build strategies and buyouts (acting on sell and buy-side and share and business deals, including auction processes). Developing close relationships, Ken uses his breadth of experience to support our clients’ strategic growth and ambitions, delivering deals across all types of M&A transactions, understanding his client’s way of working to help shape their approach and tailoring their transaction processes to minimise risk and deliver on strategic growth agendas. Ken leads on the firm’s geographic profile and approach to working with communities in Bristol, Plymouth and the Westcountry, leading the firm’s presence and engagement with businesses and community initiatives in the region. He works to build recognition for our approach, providing business-focused and solution-driven support that truly adds value.

Kutahya Cherry

Kutahya is a commercial property lawyer who currently works predominantly for developer and funder clients in the energy sector on solar, storage and other renewable projects. She has dealt with projects from inception through to sale and finance. Kutahya has also recently helped a large telecoms company better understand their property asset portfolio and has extensive experience of acquisition, funding and landlord and tenant work in all asset classes having previously worked for a number of large investment fund clients. Kutahya enjoys being part of her client’s team so she can gain a full understanding of what their commercial drivers are, working collaboratively with clients and tailoring her approach to their commercial goals.

Kutahya Cherry

Kutahya leads the commercial property part of the EPIC team. Her clients are predominantly developers, investors and funders in the clean energy sector. She has worked on a multitude of complex and large scale solar and storage projects, as well as having experience with EV infrastructure, C&I, on and off-shore wind and other renewables projects. She deals with projects from inception through to sale and finance. Kutahya’s authenticity and love for what she does shines through – she enjoys being part of her client’s strategic team so she can gain a full understanding of what their commercial drivers are, working collaboratively with clients and tailoring her approach to their commercial goals.

Lara Borrett-Lynch

Lara is the firm’s Head of Affordable Housing. She has over 20 years’ experience in residential development acting for Housing Associations, national and regional housebuilders and local authorities. Her key area of interest is the provision of affordable housing and she’s passionate about working with clients to satisfy the ever increasing need for quality housing. Lara looks to add value to her clients by being an extension of their team. She takes time to understand the aims and objectives of each transaction in order to achieve these.

Lee Ward

Lee is a Senior Associate in our Projects, Construction and Infrastructure team and specialises in dispute avoidance and dispute resolution. He acts for a range of clients including developers, employers, local authorities, contractors, consultants, and sub-contractors. Lee is particularly experienced in leading adjudication proceedings having conducted high value adjudication proceedings across a multitude of issues acting for both the Referring and Responding Party. Lee’s work involves advising on claims for delay, extensions of time, and loss and expense, regularly dealing with issues such as workmanship and design defects, repudiatory breach of contract and termination. Lee also frequently advises on the validity of applications for payment, payment notices and final account disputes. Lee’s expertise includes conducting high value court proceedings in the TCC (including pre-action negotiations), arbitration proceedings and mediation.

Leigh Woodham

Leigh Woodham is a Managing Associate with over 20 years' experience in personal injury law including both catastrophic and fatal accident claims. What sets him aside from his peers is his calm and reassuring professional nature that helps him bond with clients who have experienced significant trauma. His particular interest lies in traumatic brain injury cases but in his long career has supported clients bringing claims following a very diverse mix of injuries. Leigh has excellent attention to detail and goes above and beyond to ensure his clients are kept up to date and can understand the complex litigation procedures. Leigh Woodham - Enable Law

Lucy Gill

Lucy is a Partner who leads our Legacies team and our Inheritance & Trust Disputes team. Lucy acts for charities and private clients advising on a range of issues relating to disputes arising about estates. For private clients this can be a stressful and emotional time and Lucy and her team help families navigate disputes in a cost effective way to achieve their objectives. Lucy is also known for advising charity legacy teams about all aspects of legacy income including contentious trust and probate matters, legacy administration, charity law and probate. Lucy delivers solutions for clients beyond simple legal advice and is proud to have developed an innovative product called Legacy Accelerator to assist charities to grow their legacy income. As part of that she has recently delivered a collaborative solution to a key charity client to work as an extension of a major national charity’s in house legacy team to manage the unpredictability of the work-levels associated with the administration of their legacy income. Having acted for many large charities, Lucy has a comprehensive track record in the sector and is able to share this experience and insight with her clients and apply it to her advice. The network she has built in her career enables her to make connections between contacts to enable a collaborative approach.

Lydia Lloyd

A key member of our Restructuring & Insolvency team, Lydia advises on all aspects of formal and informal insolvency procedures, including administration and liquidation sales, both buyer and seller side, with particular experience in retail and financial sectors. She regularly works with insolvency practitioners, providing strategic support throughout the insolvency process. Lydia also advises directors on supply chain issues and close down of companies through voluntary strike off or members’ voluntary liquidation processes. She also works on solvent sales, assisting with the turnaround of distressed businesses and restructures. Lydia has practical experience of the investment bank special administration regime. She has assisted with five of the small number of investment firms to enter into special administration following the introduction of this specialist procedure as a result of the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Lydia enjoys collaboration and bringing people together across networks. She founded TMA UK NextGen Bristol, a networking organisation focused on running events to connect people at a junior level working in turnaround.

Marianne Ironside

Marianne is an Senior Associate in the Planning and Environment Team. She has significant experience advising on a range of planning matters with a particular focus on the residential development sector. Her expertise includes strategic planning advice, drafting and negotiating Planning Agreements, undertaking and planning due diligence in respect of complex transactions and advising on the intricacies of the Community Infrastructure Levy. Marianne has considerable experience working with housebuilders, retirement living providers and hoteliers as well as advising retail developers, banks and investors.

Marianne Ironside

Marina Wickens

Marina acts for housebuilders (both national and regional) and Registered Providers on all matters relating to the acquisition and promotion of sites for residential development. The work she is involved with ranges from straightforward subject to planning deals, options and promotion agreements to complex joint ventures and collaboration agreements and all related matters. With a keen interest in housing, she aims to establish great working relationships with her clients by understanding their business needs and helping them achieve the outcomes they want by delivering an excellent and efficient service.

Mark Rhys-Jones

Mark leads our dispute resolution team. A specialist in commercial litigation, banking litigation procurement challenges, dispute avoidance and contract management, Mark helps ensure clients’ projects are successfully delivered and not waylaid by disputes. At an early stage of any instruction, Mark endeavours to understand what the client’s goal is so that he can collaborate to devise an approach that achieves that outcome. He ensures he gives an opinion with his advice as to which route a client should take to achieve their desired results, rather than just a list of legal options.

Mark Greatholder

Mark leads our Commercial Energy practice at Foot Anstey within our wider Energy, Projects, Infrastructure and Construction team. He specialises in advising on the legal aspects of delivering commercial projects for clients, with particular expertise in relation to clean energy projects. Mark’s expertise extends to solar and wind (both on-shore and off-shore), district heat networks, battery storage projects, nuclear development including new nuclear build and small modular reactors, EVs, energy from waste, carbon capture, geothermal energy and green hydrogen. Mark helps his clients to develop commercially-driven strategies for successful project delivery, agree appropriate contracting models, navigate procurement processes (often within regulated environments) and draft, negotiate and implement project agreements which contain suitable contract terms, incentivisation mechanisms and payment models. He also supports his clients to manage their contracts during delivery and operational phases by helping them to understand and resolve any contractual or operational issues that can often arise. Having undertaken a number of client secondments during his career, Mark has first-hand experience of the challenges that businesses can often face. Mark draws on this experience to help him deliver his advice in a commercial context.

Mark Stutter

Mark acts for national, regional and local house builders as well as housing associations and has a keen interest in the development sector. He primarily advises and deals with land acquisitions (whether strategic options or conditional or unconditional contracts), and also advises and deals with Promotion Agreements, the disposal or acquisition of affordable housing and the grant of utility easements. Mark’s career highlight to date has been assisting with a £37 million site acquisition in Slough for Berkeley Homes. The transaction required him to put pragmatic and commercial advice to the test to help achieve the client’s goal.

Mark Li

Mark has over 16 years of experience, specialising in high value complex commercial property transactions. Mark’s experience encompasses general commercial property transactions including all aspects of landlord and tenant work, general estate management and the sale and acquisition of freehold and leasehold property. In particular, he has expertise in acting for infrastructure developers and owners in the transport and energy sectors and in dealing with development projects in both the public and private sphere. Mark is also heavily involved in the work the firm is leading in relation to electric vehicles and mobility services.

Matthew Stoate

Matt is head of our Corporate practice, a key part of which is our nationally recognised Private Equity team, which Matt founded and also leads. Our private equity group proudly represents a number of leading UK Private Equity houses and their portfolio companies and recently named winner of the Regional Legal Advisor of the Year 2020 at the Real Deals Private Equity Awards. Private Equity forms a key part of our go-to-market strategy, so is also recognised as a core lead sector for Foot Anstey, as we seek to build deep relationships with Private Equity backed management teams and portfolio companies. Matt also leads our market leading “GRIP” product, which is a tech-enabled solution to streamline and satisfy the core legal and compliance obligations of PE portfolio companies. Matt trained and qualified into the Private Equity department of the leading City firm Travers Smith and prior to joining Foot Anstey, spent several years at Kinmont, a corporate finance boutique in London acknowledged as a leader in advising management teams. Management advisory remains a core part of Matt’s practice. Our Private Equity team is recognised as a specialist in advising PE backed portfolio companies. We have built a significant specialism in undertaking bolt-on and buy-and-build M&A as part of PE backed investment propositions, often with an international element to it.

Michael Evans

Michael has nearly 30 years’ experience advising financial institutions and high net worth individuals on international trust and tax matters. Michael advises clients all over the world but with a particular focus on the Middle East and China. Recent experience includes drafting and training on non-Dom tax changes for international banks and trust companies, structuring and providing advice for high value properties in London, advising on dynastic trusts and related tax planning for Asian families and advising trustees and beneficiaries on contentious international trust issues. Michael was recently able to provide invaluable advice to a client who needed to restructure his offshore finances in light of recent changes to UK Res Non Dom tax rules. Michael is also currently advising a global law firm on developing its private client offering for its specific client base.

Michelle Seddon

Michelle joined the firm in September 2015 after relocating back to her home county of Devon from Bedfordshire. Michelle deals with all aspects of private client work including succession planning and tax advice, but she specialises in the administration of complex estates. Michelle’s work for previous clients has included dealing with Heritage Exemptions, Family Silver in Lieu of IHT, Agricultural Relief, Antiques and International assets. Michelle has more recently developed a Death in Service advice system for companies with benefit schemes, with the aim of being able to offer the trustees guidance for distribution of the benefits due to the family. Michelle is a Director of the Foot Anstey Trust Corporation, where she works alongside other Directors, to agree decisions in relation to estate administrations, court of protection applications, and attorneyships.

Michelle Biddulph

Michelle Biddulph heads our Clinical Negligence team nationally and specialises in all aspects of clinical negligence cases, with a special interest in gynaecology cases, delay in diagnosis of cancer and orthopaedic cases especially where an amputation sadly results. She has a maximum severity case load and manages some of the most technically complicated cases where clients have suffered catastrophic injury following receiving negligent medical treatment. Michelle is responsible for leading the Clinical Negligence team and ensuring that excellent advise and keeping the Client at the centre of the case resonates throughout the team. She is a natural leader and excellent litigator whose experience in managing difficult cases and vulnerable clients sets her apart from her peers. She receives a lot of direct referrals from other solicitors and has represented many clients who they themselves work for the NHS so have a good understanding of the value having the right solicitor in your corner brings. Michelle is a member of the Law Society's Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme and a senior litigator with APIL. Michelle Biddulph - Partner | Enable Law

Mike Bird

Mike Bird is the clinical negligence partner based in Truro, covering Cornwall. He has over 20 years' experience of claims involving complex medical and legal issues on behalf of claimants, particularly children with acquired brain injuries, but advises on cases of all types. He led the Group Action against Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust (re Mr K R Jones, 204 claimants). He also is Assistant Coroner for West Midlands and represents families at inquests in fatal claims. He regularly appears in local media commenting on legal issues. Mike is an AvMA Accredited specialist panel member (over 15 years), an APIL Senior Litigator, and an Assessor for APIL's Specialist Clinical Negligence Panel. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/mike-bird/

Nathan Peacey

Nathan leads the firm’s Retail and Consumer Sector and is responsible for several key client relationships. He is also is responsible for the firm’s geographic profile and approach to working with the communities where we operate, particularly leading the firm’s Bristol presence and its engagement with local business and community initiatives. Specialising in regulatory work he leads on the firm’s multi-disciplinary risk advisory offering, helping to keep clients’ strategy on track with proactive and reactive risk advice they can trust. Nathan advises clients on governance, compliance and the defence of regulatory prosecutions. Nathan’s holistic approach to risk, and ability to join the dots between areas such as legal, reputation, procurement and risk is what helps his clients achieve their goals.

Pamela-Jane Riley

Pamela-Jane Riley is a Senior Associate in Enable Law's Personal Injury team. Pamela has a particular interest in acquired brain injury claims for children and assists in managing our relationship with CBIT. Her expertise means she is well equipped to support children and identify their lifelong needs including future residence & care needs as well as more immediate adjustments required around their education and broader support. In addition, Pamela undertakes claims arising from sporting injuries. Some of her recent such cases include representing a client who suffered a brain injury as a result of a negligent tackle in a semi-professional rugby match and a client who suffered polytrauma (including suffering ongoing post concussion syndrome). Further to this Pamela is an avid horse rider and uses her own personal understanding to support clients who have suffered both injuries and financial losses as a result of equestrian accidents. In particular she has specialist knowledge in presenting claims for negligence resulting in loss of value in high value competition horses. An extremely gifted technical lawyer she has been recognised by Counsel, Case Managers and other Professionals for her creative thinking and problem solving. Pamela-Jane Riley - Enable Law

Paolo Sbuttoni

Paolo is a Partner specialising in technology and data. He is a UK and Hong Kong qualified lawyer with substantial international experience advising clients on digital transformation, data protection, cybersecurity, technology contracting, telecoms, e-commerce and, most recently, navigating new technologies such as A.I. and blockchain. Prior to joining Foot Anstey, Paolo was a partner at an international law firm and based in Hong Kong for 13 years where he advised some of the world’s leading companies in the technology, retail and financial sectors. He has acted for many major global technology companies, particularly cloud and outsourcing service providers. He has a strong focus on the Retail & Consumer sector, advising on the launch of global e-commerce platforms and digital products and services. He has also been heavily involved in the fintech market, particularly advising start-ups, banks and other financial institutions on technology procurement and launching virtual financial services.

Patrick Wetherall

Patrick leads the firm’s developer sector and is Head of Real Estate Group. With expertise in all aspects of commercial property disputes, whether property or landlord and tenant, he has acted on several multi-million pound claims. These relate to development, dilapidations and disrepair, options, agreements to purchase, contractual loss of profits, restrictive covenants, injunctions and easements. Patrick also has extensive Court of Appeal, High Court trial and arbitration experience, and has successfully resolved over 25 matters at mediation. Focused on taking a pragmatic approach to litigation and dispute resolution, Patrick always considers what the client wants and how to get results – whether that be through proactive and forthright litigation or a more conciliatory approach.

Paul Sankey

Paul Sankey has vast experience in clinical negligence claims and has advised patients suffering negligent treatment by GPs, NHS trusts and private doctors. He has particular expertise in claims for adults with serious injuries including stroke, sepsis, haemorrhage, meningitis and raised intracranial pressure, in amputation claims and the delayed diagnosis of cancer. He is recognised nationally as an expert on medical consent and expert witness work. He gives training to medical experts and has regularly spoken at local and national events, including Inspire Medi Law and Specialist Medical Info conferences, hospitals including the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, British Society of Neuroradiologists and other national meetings of medical specialists. He regularly publishes articles on medical law. Paul's expertise is reflected in both his successes for clients, but also in the frequent requests we receive for Paul to provide training for those working in the medico-legal sector, including clinicians working as expert witnesses. We would appreciate it if you could reassess his position in band 2, as earlier editions of your directory ranked Paul as a 'Leader in the Field' in London and this seems a more accurate assessment of both his skill and reputation. https://www.enablelaw.com/team/paul-sankey/

Paul Butterworth

Paul is a Legal Director in our Affordable Housing team. Paul acts for Registered Providers and Local Authorities dealing with affordable housing development, and has expertise in housing-led regeneration and the public sector grant funding system. Outside of work, Paul enjoys rugby, photography and travelling.

Paula Barnes

Paula Barnes joined our firm as a consultant in December 2022 working within our Clinical Negligence team. She has over 25 years of experience in clinical negligence, community care and public law matters. She undertakes clinical negligence claims at all levels, including catastrophic brain damage cases, cerebral palsy and acquired brain injury and spinal injury cases. Paula is a trustee at Dame Vera Lynn Children's Charity and has extensive experience supporting families with community care advice to help them access the services they need. She has clients throughout the country but retains a professional presence in both the SW and Southampton. Paula Barnes - Enable Law

Peter Singfield

Pete is a partner in our Dispute Resolution team. He has significant experience advising established, national and international Media and Retail clients about a range of operational issues including contractual matters relating to distribution and supply and contentious data and Intellectual Property, as well as advising both funds and Private Equity owned portfolio companies about matters relating to their growth including shareholder issues and dispute adjacent to share or asset purchases such as warranty claims and deferred consideration. Pete’s recent career highlight came when he supported Guernsey lead counsel in a dispute for hundreds of millions of pounds relating to unfair prejudice petition brought by minority PE shareholders in an entity behind successful exchange traded funds. Pete strives to build relationships with clients that allow him to deliver bespoke solutions that achieve the desired outcome, rather than a ‘pre-packaged’ approach.

Philip Brown

Philip is a Partner in our Real Estate team and leads the firm’s developer team. He has expertise in a wide range of real estate work with particular emphasis on commercial and residential development (both immediate and strategic) and the securing of development and project finance. Philip’s clients are made up of national, regional and local developers, promoters, housing associations, landowners disposing of land for development and banks and alternative lenders. Philip has been ranked highly in numerous Legal500 and Chambers rankings over the last decade. Outside of work Philip enjoys spending time with his young family and is a passionate sports fan; in particular he enjoys following the Exeter Chiefs and, in the summer, Somerset County Cricket Club.

Philip Parrott

Phil is a Legal Director at the firm. He is based at our Exeter office and has extensive experience in dealing with a variety of real estate centric matters, with specialisms in landlord and tenant matters, focusing on retail, industrial and corporate occupier work as well as leading on local development projects.

Rachel Brooks

Rachel is a Partner in the Private Wealth team who advises clients on tax and estate planning, with a particular niche in rural and landed estates. She can help her clients with drafting a Will, tax planning and administration of complex estates, particularly where there are succession issues. Rachel looks at the strategic planning of assets through the generations for landed estate clients and Farming families. Recently, she has advised on how to do this using business property relief and agricultural property relief to reduce inheritance tax bills and so avoid the need to sell part of the estate. She has also helped clients with creating trust structures and family offices for the protection of assets through successive generations. Rachel can provide sensitive and pragmatic advice to families on the law of mental capacity as well, which many families now find themselves needing to understand when it comes to supporting a loved one with their affairs.

Rachel Small

Rachel is an experienced property and estates litigation expert at Foot Anstey. She provides clients with clear, concise, and accurate legal advice, with an appreciation of the nuances between their commercial constraints and desired outcomes. Prior to joining Foot Anstey Rachel previously worked in-house at a large international retailer, so she’s well-placed to understand the difficulties faced internally by some clients. Recently Rachel has advised a number of landowner clients on the effects of the new electronic communications code, dealing with a number of contentious claims with regards to termination, renewal, and modification of new and existing Code agreements. Rachel has also worked on multiple “test” cases under the new electronic communications code being heard at the Lands Chamber of the Upper Tribunal.

Rachel Langley

Rachel is an expert in residential developments and commercial real estate at Foot Anstey. Her expertise is focused on the areas she is most passionate about: complex projects, social housing, regeneration and land economics.

Richard Sutton

Richard is a consultant and works advising developers, investors and tenants on commercial property transactions. He enjoys building relationships with clients and familiarising himself with their business and objectives. Richard has advised on a number of high profile multi-million pound projects. His personal favourite was advising on the acquisition and development of the former Berkeley Nuclear Laboratory site at Berkeley Green in Gloucestershire, by South Gloucestershire and Stroud College.

Rob Antrobus

Rob Antrobus Head of Enable Law and partner, Rob is based primarily in our Plymouth office, where he specialises in pursuing clinical negligence claims on behalf of claimants. Rob deals with all claims but has a particular interest in claims resulting from injuries sustained at or shortly after birth, meningitis claims and those arising out of the management of orthopaedic injuries. Rob is a member of the Law Society's Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme and a Senior Litigator with APIL. Rob has been awarded the status of Eminent Practitioner. Rob Antrobus - Partner | Enable Law

Sam Elworthy

Sam is a partner in Foot Anstey’s Commercial team. His expertise spans a diverse spectrum of commercial contracts, positioning him as a sought-after advisor across multiple sectors. Sam has a particular focus on franchising, agency, licensing, distribution, sponsorship, concession, supply of goods and services, outsourcing and hotel management arrangements. Sam is not just a legal practitioner; he’s a strategic ally for businesses navigating the intricacies of complex contractual landscapes, ensuring that they receive tailored advice that aligns with their unique needs. From structuring joint ventures to facilitating strategic alliances and overseeing bespoke projects, Sam provides comprehensive solutions that empower clients in various industries. Sam also specialises in handling ‘separation’ exercises in the context of corporate transactions. Sam is adept at drafting and negotiating transitional services arrangements, ensuring a seamless transition during pivotal moments in a company’s lifecycle. His meticulous approach provides an additional layer of assurance for clients engaged in transformative corporate activities.

Simon Beetham

Simon is a Senior Associate in the firm’s Dispute Resolution team. He has significant experience in advising clients on technically complex issues and disputes relating to all types of property, with a focus on commercial and development property. He provides high quality and pragmatic advice targeted at aiding his clients achieve their ambitions. Simon acts for a range of clients, including private landowners, financial institutions, commercial landlords and tenants as well as residential and commercial developers and asset managers. He regularly acts for clients in Court proceedings, arbitrations, tribunals and other forms of alternative dispute resolution, such as mediations and expert determinations.

Stephanie Kingdon

Stephanie has significant experience in all aspects of general property and commercial landlord and tenant disputes, in particular relating to managing and mitigating risk in transactional work. Stephanie advises on a wide range of contentious commercial property matters, and her experience extends to complex, high profile and politically sensitive advisory work. She has dealt with real estate litigation in both the High Court and Court of Appeal and has resolved disputes through mediation and arbitration. In addition to “traditional” property disputes, Stephanie also advises on planning-related matters including judicial reviews and statutory challenges.

Sue Upton

Sue Upton is a very experienced Solicitor in our team supporting clients who have suffered serious injuries, particularly brain injuries. She has over 25 years of experience of dealing with these complex, high value claims on behalf of both adults and children. She regularly deals with multi million pound claims and has extensive experience of obtaining substantial interim payments for her clients to fund the rehabilitation, treatment and support they require. In her practice she often supports clients and their families who lack capacity as a result of their injuries where the court of protection are involved. Sue Upton - Enable Law

Terence Dickens

Terence is an experienced disputes lawyer and Legal Director in the commercial litigation team. He specialises in financial services litigation, including contentious regulatory matters and related insurance coverage advice and claims (including D&O defence) and procurement disputes. Terence has been an insurance partner at a leading international insurance firm and has advised numerous financial institutions/retail financial services firms, corporates, private individuals and public sector clients, including local authorities, central government departments and insurers/reinsurers, on a wide range of financial and commercial disputes. Terence frequently acts for IFAs and investment managers in contentious matters (on both an insured and uninsured basis), including defending claims and complaints of mis-selling/breach of mandate before both the Courts and the FOS, as well as FCA investigations and disciplinary proceedings and in respect of restrictive covenant and breach of confidentiality issues arising upon the exit of senior personnel/advisors. Terence takes a risk-based approach, with cost-benefit firmly in mind, and is keen advocate of ADR. He seeks to keep relationships on track by focussing upon both dispute avoidance and the resolution of disputes at an early stage, with commercial considerations front and centre in his advice.

Tim Wheen

Tim is an experienced property lawyer dealing primarily with site acquisitions, site assembly, property development work and the negotiation of planning agreements. Tim’s experience covers the full spectrum of development and commercial property matters and he is particularly well known for the extensive work that he has carried out for the house building industry. Some of Tim’s work highlights include: Acquisition of various large Greenfield development sites across London and the South East involving complex negotiations and drafting (including multi-layered overage provisions, security packages and purchase price adjustment mechanisms). Land values ranging from £10m-£40m. Purchase of a large development site in Twickenham for £13m and advising on a wide range of complex title issues including the enforceability of restrictive covenants and unregistered land title issues. Purchase of a £8m site in central London and the sub-sale of this site for £15m once planning permission had been granted. Advising extensively on rights of light issues. Sale of various Affordable Housing schemes on both a Golden Brick and Turnkey basis. Advising on various Planning Agreements involving complex viability drafting, development obligations and development constraints.

Tim Jones

Tim Jones is a Legal Director and has extensive experience supporting clients following brain and spinal injuries. He is very active in his fields of expertise providing support to beneficiaries of the Brain Injury Group, the Major Trauma Group as well as a number of other charities. He stays on top of relevant case law changes and often drafts articles he shares with professionals that need to be aware of them to better service their clients. Tim has been fundamental at setting up a legal clinic supporting patients of the Intensive Care Unit in Treliske Hospital as well as the people that care for them. He has also been instrumental in setting up a clinic at Musgrove Hospital which has been successfully running now for over 10 years. Tim Jones - Legal Director | Enable Law

Tim Pritchard

Tim is a member of our restructuring and insolvency team and provides advisory support to a broad range of businesses, directors, financial institutions and insolvency practitioners. Increasingly Tim advises distressed corporates and their directors in relation to their statutory duties, supporting them as they make ongoing decisions in respect of trading, investments and asset disposals. As a result of a secondment with a High Street Clearing Bank, Tim has significant experience in providing advice to financial institutions in respect of their stressed and distressed portfolios, covering new lending, security structures and enforcement. He also works with lenders and investors operating in the distressed debt sector. Another highlight has been advising five of the small number of investment firms to enter into special administration following the introduction of the specialist procedure as a result of the collapse of Lehman Brothers – Tim is one of a limited number of lawyers with significant experience in this area. Tim particularly enjoys the technical detail of restructuring and insolvency work, and has created a knowledge sharing culture around this within the firm enabling colleagues to learn from one another and be better prepared to assist clients.

Toby Larkham

Toby has significant experience in advising clients on a range of banking and finance transactions, with a particular focus on real estate and leveraged finance and private equity debt work. He has acted extensively for the main clearing banks and various private lenders and borrowers in respect of investment and development finance transactions, with a particular focus on cross border transactions. In the Private Equity space, Toby has advised Piper Private Equity and others, together with their portfolio companies, on the debt and security aspects of numerous investments.

Tris Tucker

Tris is a partner in the Projects, Construction and Infrastructure team specialising in all forms of dispute resolution, dispute avoidance and strategic advice on both national and international projects. Tris advises employers, consultants and contractors on all aspects of construction and engineering disputes and is very experienced in adjudication, arbitration and litigation. He specialises in defending and pursuing disputes against and for developers, employers, main contractors and sub-contractors as well as architects, engineers and other construction professionals. Tris also has a wealth of experience in NEC, JCT and FIDIC forms of contract and regularly deals with issues such as defects, design responsibility, delay and associated costs, interim applications, final accounts and fee recovery. A recent highlight for Tris was supporting a client in successfully avoiding a major dispute on the Crossrail project. Tris has experience on major projects in other jurisdictions such as Europe, the US and the Middle East.

Zahir Nayani

Zahir is a partner in our Islamic finance practice and advises on a range of real estate driven transactions for both investors and financial institutions. He is named in the Legal 500 2023 as a Next Generation Partner in Islamic finance in London and described by clients as ‘an incredibly smart lawyer with a close eye on the commercial aspects of legal decision making’ and ‘very approachable, responsive and knowledgeable.’ Zahir joined the firm over a decade ago as one of the first fee earners in our then newly established Bristol office and, after a client-side stint as General Counsel at a privately-owned investment advisory firm in the West End, returned to Foot Anstey in 2019. He aims to provide solutions-focused advice to clients, having been one himself. He is well-versed in structuring real estate investments and financings in line with our clients’ strategic aims, and seeing those through the full transaction lifecycle. He enjoys working collaboratively with stakeholders and transaction counterparties and aims to impart advice grounded in commerciality and pragmatism.

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