Browne Jacobson LLP

Amanda Callaghan

Amanda is Head of Office in Manchester. She has over 30 years’ experience in the healthcare advisory and claims field and is well respected by clients, experts and legal peers.  She is a leading individual and is recognised for her depth of knowledge of healthcare organisations and her commitment to the NHS and its clinicians.  Amanda is regularly involved in training lawyers and clinicians and has presented at the annual BMA Medico-legal conference. Her clients have described her variously as ‘tenacious’ and having ‘impressive legal and clinical knowledge and experience’ and they value her team approach to litigation, providing constant support and accessibility to all involved.

Ann Cojeen

Ann Cojeen specialises in all aspects of commercial property healthcare matters for independent and public healthcare organisations and medical professionals and has considerable experience in this sector.

Ben Bentley

Ben is an accomplished Partner Barrister working in the firm’s in-house advocacy team since his call to the Bar in 2008. He routinely appears in court to conduct trials, coroner’s inquests and to prosecute on behalf of government regulatory agencies at various tribunals. He is adept at drafting court pleadings, advising on issues of liability and quantum in personal injury matters, and handling complex civil procedure applications. He has had considerable success in employer and public liability matters in court and has also achieved notable victories defending against credit hire claims. He is additionally experienced in dealing with costs matters, particularly in challenging the recovery of after the event insurance premiums. Ben’s education practice also extends to prosecution on behalf of the National College for Teaching & Leadership; and advising and advocating at all levels of Tribunal in respect to Special Educational Needs and Disability Discrimination matters.

Cat Driscoll

Charlotte Butler

Christian Dingwall

Christian qualified as a solicitor in 1986 and joined Browne Jacobson in 2019 as a partner in its Commercial Health team.  He advises health and social care clients, including many NHS trusts, foundation trusts, commissioners and other bodies, about commercial and corporate law, governance, compliance and regulation. Christian specialises in organisational and service transformation in the NHS and wider health sector, including, mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures, integrated care partnerships and reconfiguration.   Legal directories rate him as a top lawyer for health transactions.

Dai Durbridge

Daljit Kaur

Senior Associate, Daljit, joined Browne Jacobson following over 11 years in local government and works within the firm’s Business Services team supporting our education clients. She specialises in providing pastoral advice to schools, academies and educational establishments within the education sector as well providing support for appeals against EHC Plans and Disability Discrimination in the First Tier Tribunal. She also advises clients on Freedom of Information requests and Data Protection.

Daniel O’Brien

associate

Dominic Buckley

Ed Pollard

Ed is a partner in the firm and specialises in health advisory work to include serious medical treatment matters, mental health, inquests, Court of Protection, fitness to practise, mental capacity, the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards, human rights and judicial review. Ed works with many NHS Trusts, national NHS commissioners, NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups and private health providers across the country.  He also has significant experience of assisting insurers in all aspects of their cover, with particular focus on fitness to practise proceedings and inquests.

Emma Marshall

Farzana Desai

Farzana is a Senior Associate Solicitor who joined the firm in May 2020 to specialize in Immigration Law. She has significant experience in the Immigration Law field which consists of both within a private law firm and more recently has spent 5 years in a multi-disciplinary corporate environment within the Legal Services function of a Big 4 financial services firm. Farzana has wide ranging experience including: UK inbound applications – Predominately corporate immigration covering work permissions under the Points Based System, sponsor license applications including license issues, settlement and British Nationality applications for individuals and dependents; Brexit related projects – advising & planning on the impact of Brexit on company workforce across the UK and EU. Also assisting with applications under the EU Settlement Scheme; Training on the UK Immigration points-based system to organisations HR personnel; Immigration audits – mock auditing the compliance of employer and educational institutions through on-site review and reporting.

Gemma Corlett

Gemma is a Senior Associate who specialises in defending high value clinical negligence claims for NHS Resolution and healthcare Trusts and has a real talent for client relationship building. Gemma has a long history in the health sector and a wealth of experience of acting in claims from the patient, NHS and private clinicians’ perspectives, and it shows. Our largest client has made a point of singling her out for praise for her grip of exactly what they want. Despite a stretching caseload with an average damages reserve of £10-15million per case and her supervision of others, Gemma also recognises the need to play her part in the legal fabric in Manchester and also finds time to support the Manchester office profile. She led the recent, incredibly successful, ‘12 days of Christmas’ initiative, planning joint events and donations to 12 different charities and arranging the media coverage.

Gerard Hanratty

Gerard heads Browne Jacobson’s Health Sector and continues to be at the forefront of advising the NHS nationally and health sector overall on the development of Integrated Care Systems and major service reconfiguration projects. He is regularly sought for advice on all matters relating to public law, especially when public bodies face challenging decisions and he has successfully defended many judicial reviews. His expertise and pragmatic approach helps clients deliver on their plans and understand how to deal with challenges. The coming year will bring further work on the developing health and social care system, as well as advice on how to meet the challenges of introducing digital technology into the sector.

Graham Ball

Heather Caddy

Since joining Browne Jacobson in 2013 as a Senior Associate, Heather has provided specialist advice and support to both public (NHS England, NHS Acute Trusts, Mental Health Trusts, Ambulance Services, Clinical Commissioning Groups) and independent health sector organisations as well as individual healthcare practitioners.  More recently, her practice interest has expanded, to include Court of Protection, Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards and Mental Health Law. Very recently Heather impressed the team with the way she cut through a complex mental health matter concerning the interplay between the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the Mental Health Act 1983 and the impact of recent Supreme Court decisions relating to this area. Heather is a really versatile healthcare lawyer, which was of vital importance when she joined our then quite small team in 2013 and she continues to play her part as trusted advisor to our clients both directly and a really knowledgeable and friendly go-to for our trainees and others joining us who are new to the healthcare team and its specialist work.

Helen Cairns

Principal Associate

Helen Simm

Helen advises corporate and individual clients within investigations and prosecutions by the major regulators including the Serious Fraud Office, Health and Safety Executive, Environment Agency and Financial Conduct Authority.

Helen E Taylor

Associate, Helen, is based in Manchester and specialises in property transactional work. Helen has over seven years’ experience advising clients on a wide range of property matters.

Ian Deakin

Ian is an employment partner and leads our Manchester team. Ian advises clients across the full spectrum of employment issues including litigation, strategic issues and day to day advice. Ian specialises in Employment Tribunal litigation as well as Employment Status and TUPE transfers. Last year’s Legal 500 entry stated that Ian gives “sound and commercial advice”.  Ian continues to support the growth of the employment team in the North West and nationally and is a recognised and formidable employment tribunal advocate.”

Jason Nash

Kerren Daly

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Lee Ashwood

Senior Associate

Michael Mousdale

Mike is a partner in our government and infrastructure team. Mike specialises in public procurement, commercial public sector projects and leads our Waste and Recycling Group. He is recognised as a leading expert in local government law and public procurement. Mike advises on innovative transactional work for public sector bodies and those who supply to the public sector. After an early career in local government, Mike became a leading procurement and projects lawyer, advising upon many of the first PFI/PPP projects and delivering some of the most innovative deals in the public sector, including the first LLP structured partnership Kier Sheffield LLP and a number of strategic partnerships (including joint ventures arrangements under the One Barnet programme). Mike has advised on a number of landmark PFI deals, including the Greater Manchester and Merseyside Waste schemes, the Greater Manchester Police project and a number of schools projects, including the first all secondary school estate project (Haringey), the first Voluntary Aided project (Cardinal Heenan in Leeds) and the first SEN PFI (Salford). Mike is a regular speaker on procurement and alternative delivery vehicles for organisations such as CIPF An and White Paper. He wrote the Legal Guidance on collaboration for the Welsh Local Government Association and recently authored a guide on Insourcing for CIPFA.

Mike Mousdale

Mike is a recognised leader in the fields of public procurement, local government, administrative and public law, having led on some of the largest and most innovative transactions in the sector. He acted on three of the first four local authority PFI schemes, delivered the first local government LLP joint venture and put together a number of strategic partnerships. Mike’s experience covers all services, including schools, health, waste, leisure, IT and support services, transport and housing. Mike speaks at many conferences and seminars, such as for SOLACE, the LGA and Solicitors in Local Government. He is a regular speaker at the leading public procurement conference run by White Paper Conferences, alongside other leading practitioners. He regularly provides training to clients and organisations such as CIPFA on subjects such as procurement, local authority companies and commercialisation of services in local government.

Miriam Onwochei-Garcia

Nat Avdiu

Nat has been assisting a number of local authorities with procurement exercises, commercial contracts and commercial projects. Some of the matters that she has been involved in include: Advising and drafting various commercial agreements in respect of various types of services including income and management systems, benefit systems, social care, children’s services, software and licences, adult and community learning, procuring bus and bus services and catering; Advising academy trusts on various agreements to enable academy conversions and transfers including schools build or refurbished through PFI; Advising a number of local authorities in respect of alternative delivery models for setting up trading companies including the use of the Teckal exception and community benefit societies; Working in collaboration with the Commercial Health team to carry out due diligence exercises for acquisitions in the public health sector.

Paul Kirkpatrick

Paul joined the Commercial Dispute Resolution Team in Manchester in 2020 having previously led Dispute Resolution teams at national commercial law firms, based in the Midlands and the South East respectively. Paul acts for major corporates, working closely with in-house teams and General Counsel to achieve commercial resolutions to business-critical issues. Paul acts as the lead-partner on a wide variety of commercial matters, and takes overall responsibility for numerous key client relationships. Paul specialising in high-value, complex litigation, often with an international dimension. He advises on a wide variety of commercial and contractual matters, including disputes involving: breach of contract, professional negligence, breach of warranty, shareholders’ disputes, breach of confidence and numerous other commercial issues, frequently involving foreign jurisdictions. He has expertise in the automotive sector and has a wealth of experience in cross-border disputes and corporate litigation. His experience includes representing clients from pre-action through to trial and injunctive proceedings. Paul also has a substantial amount of experience in resolving disputes through alternative dispute resolution, including leading numerous mediations, without prejudice meetings and multi-party round-table discussions.

Paula Hamer

Paula has over 20 years’ real estate experience with particular expertise in complex development projects.  Paula is praised by clients for her “professionalism and commitment to understanding our requirements”, whilst other solicitors welcome “her willingness to try to find solutions that work”. Paula acts for clients from both the private and public sector and specialises in development, regeneration and investment transactions.

Peter Allen

Peter specialises in advising on corporate transactions of all kinds, particularly M&A and complex joint ventures – most often acting for owners and managers of private businesses when selling to trade or financial buyers. Whilst he operates across sector lines, he has particular experience of advising on deals in the food and beverage and healthcare sectors. Peter has a strong reputation with clients and fellow market practitioners for his pragmatic, constructive and commercial approach on transactions.

Rebecca Fitzpatrick

Rebecca leads the mental health and social care advisory team from the Manchester office. One of the leading national specialists in mental health and mental capacity law, with over 20 years of experience in the field including work in relation to the Mental Health Act, the Court of Protection (mental capacity issues), the High Court (complex treatment cases, e.g. involving children), the Administrative Court (judicial review, human rights and community care issues) and the Coroner’s Court. She sits as a fee-paid First-Tier Tribunal judge (mental health) and also regularly lectures in the above areas of law to a range of professionals, including at national and international conferences in the field. Becky is well known for her expertise in the areas of consent, capacity and best interests. She regularly advises in relation to national guidance and strategy on mental health such as NHS England’s Five Year Forward View for Mental Health & the Transforming Care programme.

Ryan Brown

Ryan is a partner in our corporate team and is based in Manchester. He was noted as a ‘star in the making’ by The Legal 500 in 2021. Ryan advises on all aspects of corporate law but has a particular focus on private equity transactions (acting for investors, investees and management teams) and complex international M&A. Ryan has extensive experience preparing companies, shareholders and management teams for an exit. He is seen by many of his clients as an extension of their senior management team and is regularly used by his clients as a sounding board for strategic decisions, particularly those relating to incentivising senior employees, M&A, re-organisations and succession planning. He also supports a number of large corporates with their M&A strategy. Ryan’s practice covers various sectors but some of his notable clients on the private equity side include Palatine Private Equity, Maven Capital Partners and Apiary Capital and on the corporate side include Edit Agency, the CTS Group, Triangle Fire Systems and Access Creative College. Before becoming a partner, he was shortlisted for “Lawyer of the Year” at the Insider North West Young Professionals Awards 2020, the Made In Manchester Awards 2020 and the JCI Manchester Young Talent Awards 2020. He has also produced some topical thought leadership articles on the pitfalls of vendor due diligence in the context of W&I insurance and how retentions could be unlocked by utilising insurance products.

Tom Briant-Evans

Tom is a senior associate in the education team and has been involved in the sector for almost 10 years. Although Tom regularly advises maintained and independent schools his focus is primarily on the academy sector where, having trained as a corporate lawyer, he specialises in corporate and commercial advice to academy trusts. Tom has built up considerable experience in advising trusts on incorporations, conversions, transfers and merger projects and along the way has dealt with all types of school including special, PFI, AP, VA, VC, foundation and trust schools as well as advising on numerous free school projects. In addition to conversion work, Tom has been involved in several complex and high-profile re-brokerage matters acting on behalf of DfE appointed trustees. Away from the transactional side of his practice, Tom regularly supports trusts with amendments to their articles of association, funding agreements and wider governance issues. Tom also advises trusts on their commercial dealings be it through the incorporation of trading subsidiaries or through the establishment of robust commercial contacts and SLAs with third-party providers.

Victoria Thourgood