Lawyers in Scotland

Catriona Munro

Before joining the Firm in 1998, Catriona worked in Brussels and London. She is qualified as a solicitor both in England & Wales and in Scotland. Although she has a wide-ranging practice, her particular areas of expertise are cartels and contentious competition proceedings. She has acted in a number of major EU and UK cases, including several successful leniency applications. She has extensive experience of private damages cases in England & Wales, Scotland and other jurisdictions, acting for both claimants and defendants, and in the Competition Appeal Tribunal and in the ordinary courts. She was recently described as an opponent in litigation as “someone to have on your side, not against you". Her practice also includes advising on merger clearances, competition complaints, state aids and public procurement as well as other areas of European and competition law. Catriona has experience of anti-dumping proceedings and European Court challenges. Catriona has for a number of years contributed to Getting the Deal Through's publication Private Antitrust Litigation and contributed the Scotland chapter to a major textbook on International Competition Litigation.

Dentons

Catriona Smith

Catriona provides specialist corporate and banking advice to many of the major banks in the UK and a variety of corporate borrowers. She has a particular focus on the shipping, energy and offshore supply chain sectors. Based in the Aberdeen office Catriona maintains a strong practice handling major transactions in the onshore – and offshore renewables, offshore supply chain and shipping sectors. Her finance experience includes specialist ship finance, conventional and Islamic financing structures and bond issues, and she deals regularly with ship and energy finance transactions across multiple jurisdictions and time zones. Catriona recently acted for a UK leader in a major port refinancing and redevelopment and acted for a UK leader in a financing of an onshore windfarm development.

Addleshaw Goddard

Charlotte Doyle

Charlotte is a Principal Associate in the Corporate Restructuring & Advisory department. She advises a range of clients including insolvency practitioners, directors, creditors and banks on all contentious and non contentious matters arising out of corporate insolvencies. Charlotte's expertise include; advising on the sale and purchase of businesses and assets in an insolvency context, conducting security reviews and advising on the enforceability of security, as well as advising insolvency practitioners in relation to antecedent transactions.

Shoosmiths

Charlotte Duce

Charlotte is a legal director in the Corporate Restructuring and Advisory team, having recently joined Shoosmiths from a global practice. Charlotte has experience of all aspects of corporate restructuring and turnaround, formal insolvencies, distressed M&A and distressed real estate. Charlotte has extensive experience advising clearing banks, ABLs and other financial institutions in their dealings with distressed and insolvent customers. She was seconded to the in-house legal team of a global lender where she supported the business in its bilateral and syndicated lending to distressed customers and advised on early options and refinancing strategies. Charlotte has also worked advising insolvency practitioners and receivers in all aspects of formal insolvencies and distressed property sales. Charlotte has regularly been recognised in the legal directories and is a member of the West Midlands R3 Women in Business committee.

Shoosmiths

Charlotte Staples

Charlotte is a Principal Associate employment lawyer who advises and provides support to HR teams and In-House Lawyers. She provides commercial and strategic advice on all areas of human resources and employment law from dealing with day to day disciplinary, grievance and performance issues to advising on large scale restructure and redundancy programs. Having worked in private practice and in-house, Charlotte understands the pressures and challenges faced by both local, national and international businesses in today's climate; providing advice to enhance and develop the client's business. Examples of work handled by Charlotte include: advising a large airline on a multiple tribunal claim relating to crew’s rights to holiday pay under the Civil Aviation (Working Time) Regulations; advising a European pharmaceutical company on the effects of TUPE and assisting the client with the legal and practical steps of setting itself up as an employer in the UK; advising a company in the healthcare industry on pursuing a High Court injunction to prevent an employee from breaching their restrictive covenants; conducting an equal pay audit for a large rental car company, advising on the effects of the audit and how to mitigate any liabilities; advising a large retail client in relation to a complex whistleblowing and disability discrimination Tribunal claim; advising a large travel company in relation to the re-sourcing of various support functions and the outsourcing of other support functions overseas; advising clients across different industries in relation to claims brought against them in the Employment Tribunal and the Employment Appeal Tribunal and representing clients in Employment Tribunal hearings. Charlotte also advises senior executives/employees in relation to issues that have arisen during/at the end of their employment and she advises on the terms of settlement agreements. Charlotte regularly writes and delivers training courses and workshops on a variety of topics for managers, HR professionals and in-house lawyers. Charlotte trained and qualified with Shoosmithsin 2006. She undertook a secondment in 2008/09 during which she worked for a global energy company and a further secondment in 2018 during which she worked for the UK division of a global pharmacy led health and beauty company.

Shoosmiths

Chris Bowie

Senior Associate

CMS

Chris McGarvey

Partner

CMS

Chris Pritchett

Chris is a commercial Energy and Mobility partner, with nearly 20 years' experience in the sustainability sphere. With specialist knowledge of battery storage, solar, EV infrastructure and wind, Chris regularly advises funders, asset owners, developers and contractors on renewable energy projects and the trading and procurement of renewable power. From PPAs and optimisation agreements to commercial frameworks for energy and EV developments, Chris has worked on some of the most exciting UK and international energy and mobility developments. He is also a keen advocate for innovation in the energy and mobility space and is passionate about working on new commercial models to drive ever quicker towards Net Zero, from voluntary carbon offset schemes, local energy markets and a host of data-driven flexibility projects. Chris also takes an active role in the development of energy policy, and was a steering group member of the Government's Energy Data Task Force as well as chairing the Electricity Storage Networks Markets and Revenues Group. He was also included in The Lawyer's HOT 100 for his pioneering work in battery storage and EV Charging.

Shoosmiths

Christian Cockcroft

Christian is a data, privacy and regulatory lawyer whose practice spans a broad spectrum of data governance, data regulation (antitrust, privacy and sectoral) and cybersecurity related work. Christian is versed in a multitude of privacy laws, including GDPR, the PECRs (and related cookie-law), CCPA and PIPEDA, while his wider regulatory experience involves advising on antitrust, data governance and market access laws, law enforcement access & lawful intercept, and sector/industry-specific laws and codes of practice (including HIPPA, SOX, DORA, ISO information security standards and PCI-DSS). This mix of experience makes Christian uniquely placed to assist multi-national organisations in navigating a range of cross-border compliance issues, from implementing global privacy programs and advising on cross-border data breaches, complex strategic or transactions matters (such as outsourcing or digital transformation global), as well as advising on novel or higher-risk technologies (e.g., MarTech, AI-regulation, blockchain, crypto-tech, NFTs, metaverse etc.). Christian trained and practised in the Brussels office of a US law firm, before moving in-house, most recently as General Counsel & Data Protection Officer for an international security organization, before joining Shoosmiths in 2021. Representative engagements include: Assisting multiple organisations in navigating data transfer compliance, including Schrems II compliance, model clauses and docking arrangements, transfer risk assessments (having conducted over 20 TRAs in 2022) and negotiating supplementary security measures. Advised a number of organisations in the acquisition of Binding Corporate Rules, including acting on one of the UK’s first post-Brexit standalone BCR applications for a leading Ed-tech provider. Conducted an international data mapping and compliance project for a Japanese automotive manufacturer. Assisted a large timeshare and resort provider with its global privacy & data compliance efforts, including data mapping, vendor management, revision of existing privacy and information security policies, use of MarTech and cookie compliance. Advising on multiple intra-group data transfer arrangements for companies spanning a broad range of sectors (e.g., banking, social media, telecommunications, heavy industry, automotive etc.). Advised a global bank on a $100m+ outsourcing arrangement with an edge-to-cloud provider, including negotiating contractual arrangements with vendors, drafting information security schedules and advising on associated data transfers issues. Advised a major social networking company on both privacy and antitrust aspects of its acquisition of a popular OTT messaging platform. Advice to a global credit rating agency on a range of privacy matters, including the use of AI-enabled decision-making technologies. Advice to various telecos, ISPs and digital advertising agencies on PECR compliance, use of location data and compliant data monetization strategies. Working with a multitude of automotive manufacturers on a range of privacy matters associated with connected car technology and law enforcement access to data. MarTech and privacy advice to a range of industry leaders, publishers and digital advertising agencies on TP cookie sunsetting. Advice to a leading provider of coworking on its global use of AI-enabled CCTV. Advised a global electronics manufacturer in a global data incident involving regulatory filings in over 30 jurisdictions.

Shoosmiths LLP

Christine Worthington

Partner

CMS

Christopher Dickson

Partner

CMS

Christopher King

Chris is a real estate lawyer with over 15 years’ experience of a mix of commercial property transactions advising both companies and public sector clients. His experience includes: Acting for an acquisitional discount retail food store and one of the main fast-food drive thru operators, working on conditional contracts and development agreements for lease. Working on acquisitions, sales, development agreements and a key leisure restructuring project for a north-west local authority. Regeneration including acquisitions, development agreements and development agreements for lease – private rented sector, retail and leisure including a performance venue. Hotel acquisitions including development agreements and sale and lease back arrangements. Looking after the property interests of an air services operator at Leeds Bradford Airport. The disposition of a strategic East Yorkshire site to a multi-national manufacturing company. Advising landowners on renewable projects for in-shore wind and solar farm development. Acting for a local independent school including with neighbouring properties after a major redevelopment.

Shoosmiths

Claire Miller

Senior Associate

CMS

Claire Wallis

Partner

CMS

Claire Withers

Claire is a senior associate specialising in equity incentive arrangements, reward structures and corporate tax. She advises on employee and management incentive arrangements, including design, implementation and any transaction-related implications. She also advises on a broad range of transactional and advisory tax matters, with particular emphasis on real estate, mergers and acquisitions and employment related tax. Claire is a chartered tax adviser and a member of the Chartered Institute of Taxation, Association of Tax Technicians and Share Plan Lawyers Group. She sits on the committee of the Edinburgh branch of Women in Tax.

Burges Salmon LLP

Colin Hutton

Partner

CMS

Colin Keenan

Colin joined Dentons (formerly MMS) as a partner in the Real Estate department in March 2013, based in the Glasgow office. He specialises in shopping Centre acquisitions, disposals and asset management; property development; forward funding and forward commitments and tax efficient structures.

Dentons

Colin Lawrie

CMS

Craig Hunter

DLA Piper

Craig Kennedy

Craig is a counsel in our White Collar and Government Investigations team. He is an award-winning Accredited Counter Fraud Specialist with a particular interest in cyber crime, asset tracing and civil recoveries. He is an experienced civil litigator and has a wealth of experience in advising domestic and international clients on high-value, complex, cross-border white collar crime matters in addition to a wide range of commercial disputes. Craig regularly advises clients on the proactive steps that can and should be taken by businesses to mitigate the ever-increasing threat posed by cyber crime. He also has experience of advising clients in the immediate aftermath of a cyber attack, on the steps that should be taken to respond to the attack and on managing the litigation/regulatory risks presented by it. Craig is a member of the Cybercrime Practitioners Association and regularly presents on cyber and white collar crime matters throughout the UK.

Dentons

Craig Wilson

CMS

Danny Lee

Danny is a partner in the firm’s corporate finance team, having joined Burges Salmon’s new Scottish office in 2019. Danny specialises in corporate finance and company law, including M&A, joint ventures, private equity and restructurings. Danny covers a range of sectors, but with a particular focus on the energy sector (notably renewables), food and drink, technology and life sciences/pharma sectors. Recent experience includes: advising Panoramic Growth Equity on its investment in Big Drop Brewing Company; advising Fern Fibre Limited and Octopus Investments on the acquisition of internet service provider M12 Solutions and the Giganet brand together with a £250m funding package; advising Riverstone on the sale of Forsa Energy’s distributed flexible power generation platform to Tiger Infrastructure Partners; advising Calcivis on its equity investment by SIB and Archangels; advising Genus plc on its strategic investment in genetics improvement consultancy, Xelect.

Burges Salmon LLP

Darina Kerr

Partner

CMS

Darren Craig

Office Managing Partner

CMS