About

Paul Brady was called to the Irish Bar in 1999 and began his legal career as a barrister. Since then, he has worked in practice and in-house in commercial, employment, corporate, tax, pensions and trusts and, most recently, aviation. He joined CityJet as its first legal counsel in 2015 and has assisted on CityJet’s metamorphosis from a scheduled airline to an established provider of wetlease services in Europe and the negotiation of several major wetlease arrangements with some of Europe’s leading airline groups. He is responsible for developing the in-house legal function from scratch and through a period of rapid change and growth. He identifies that ‘in four years, the legal function has grown to three lawyers and an insurance specialist. I have sought to keep our objective simple – to protect the company and serve the other departments with legal advice and support which is commercial and effective. The wider company has been affected in that there is greater discipline around contract negotiation, more cognisance of risk allocation in contracts and greater awareness of the company’s rights and obligations’. Brady has overseen the acquisition of 33 aircraft valued in excess of US$600m in a three year period and has concluded major long term wetlease arrangements with some of Europe’s leading airline groups. In particular, he and his team worked on the acquisition of Blue1 Oy in Finland and Cimber in Denmark. He also played a major role in the successful conclusion of a UK Competition and Mergers Authority investigation into the company’s Dublin London wetlease with Aer Lingus. Brady highlights that, the legal team’s workload is ‘significant’ and it is ‘essential that it can be shared and that I am confident in delegating. I consider myself very lucky to have had the talent and commitment of our senior legal counsel, Jane Logan-Phelan, and, more recently, of James Finnegan as our legal counsel. Being part of the CityJet journey has been challenging and rewarding. I am part of a true interdependent team who work very hard for each other and our airline customers’. Brady is highly recommended by peers and external counsels he has worked with as well as others in the aviation legal market. One nominator has ‘always been impressed by [Brady’s] approach. He is an ideal client, very responsive and understands both the commercial and legal issues arising across a range of areas. He is very diligent and hard-working and is really a pleasure to work with’. Another nominator highlights that ‘Paul Brady is a highly technical and very capable lawyer. He has repeatedly demonstrated a comprehensive understanding of the highly technical tax and duty issues in which I have been involved with CityJet. He clearly works long hours and has constant eye on the big picture, and pivots effortlessly from the minutiae of customs duty to the wider commercial implications’.