England - London • Employment

Slaughter and May

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The pensions department at Slaughter and May is lauded by clients as being a ‘very capable team’ with ‘incredible technical expertise’. Charles Cameron leads the practice and is experienced on benefit change exercises and innovative de-risking strategies, particularly within the industrial and manufacturing industries. More broadly, the team is well-equipped to advise its clients on the full gamut of advisory pensions work, which includes providing cross-border assistance in transactional matters for its clients, including trustees, insurers, and employers. Sandeep Maudgil is a key contact for strategic and high-value pension work, while Daniel Schaffer is a name to note for the implementation of benefit redesign projects. Chris Sharpe was promoted to partner in May 2022.

Legal 500 Editorial commentary

Testimonials

Collated independently by Legal 500 research team.

  • ‘Chris Sharpe brings a fresh approach to the team.’

  • ‘Focused on giving the best advice and doing the right thing.’

  • ‘Incredible technical expertise and experience dealing with pension scheme trustees, which is deployed to assist corporate clients.’

  • ‘Adrien Mallevays' technical expertise is unquestionable and his approach to client engagement and clear, commercial and confident application of the law is different to most of his peers.’

  • ‘The team at Slaughter and May has a strong client focus and successfully handles the most complex of legal pension issues. The team is collaborative, responsive, and draws on specialist expertise from other areas of Slaughter and May, where needed. Slaughter and May have recognised the increased need for virtual meetings and have invested in gold standard conferencing facilities at their offices.’

  • ‘Lead partner Daniel Schaffer goes out of way to listen, communicate and respond. An exceptionally strong individual who seems able to visualise every eventuality to ensure that all angles are covered. All of the individuals at Slaughter and May display strong ethical and professional values and area pleasure to work with.’

  • ‘Very capable team with broad experience. Responsive and quick.’

  • ‘Easy to strike up a good working relationship with the team.’

Key clients

  • BBC Pension Scheme
  • BT Pension Scheme
  • Caterpillar Pension Plans
  • Diageo plc
  • E.ON UK PLC
  • GSK plc
  • Legal & General
  • Phillips 66 Pension Plan
  • Railways Pension Trustee Company
  • Royal Mail
  • SCA UK Pension Plan
  • Severn Trent pension schemes
  • Tata Steel UK (British Steel Pension Scheme)
  • Yell UK

Work highlights

  • Advised Intact Financial Corporation and RSA on a £6.5bn buy-in insurance transaction with Pension Insurance Corporation in respect of the liabilities of two pension schemes sponsored by RSA.
  • Advised Tata Steel UK on a £2bn tranche of a buy-in transaction with Legal & General for the British Steel Pension Scheme.
  • Advised a number of FTSE 100 companies, including Diageo, and significant pension schemes on urgent actions required to manage liquidity needs as a result of market reaction to the UK Government’s mini-budget delivered in September 2022.

Lawyers

Hall of Fame

The lawyers at the very top of the profession, widely known and respected by peers and clients for their longstanding involvement in market-leading work.

Charles Cameron

Charles Cameron

Hall of fameSlaughter and May

Partner; Charles advises sponsors, trustees and insurers on corporate pension plans.  His experience ranges from pension plan restructuring driven by M&A or insolvency, to funding and covenant negotiations on change of control, to plan closures. Corporate pension plans combine uniquely the features of reputation sensitivity and financial risk in a legal context which is complex, highly regulated and where the positions of trustees, sponsors, shareholders, employers, unions, regulators and politicians need reconciling.  Charles has a lot of experience in doing so, and in leading or being part of the multi-disciplinary adviser teams necessary, sourced from our financing, insurance, tax and dispute resolution groups.

Daniel Schaffer

Hall of fameSlaughter and May

Partner; Dan is a partner in our Pensions Employment & Incentives Group. He joined the firm in 2017. He has over twenty two years of partner experience. His practice is transactional, general advisory and contentious.  He advises employers and trustees.  Dan’s experience includes preparing for a sale process, benefit redesign and covenant and funding solutions.

Leading individuals

Sandeep Maudgil

Slaughter and May

Partner; Sandeep advises on a broad variety of pensions and employment-related matters. His practice is transactional, general advisory and contentious. He advises employers and trustees. His experience includes management of issues arising from scheme funding deficits, implementing the transition to more affordable benefit structures and full or partial buy-outs of pension scheme liabilities. He is at the forefront of thinking in developing collective defined contribution (CDC) schemes, acting as the sole external legal adviser on the ground breaking CDC scheme which Royal Mail designed with their unions under the new Pension Schemes Act 2021 regime.

Practice head

The lawyer(s) leading their teams.

Charles Cameron

Other key lawyers

Sandeep Maudgil, Daniel Schaffer, Chris Sharpe, Adrien Mallevays