Champagne time: only a few barristers have so far celebrated becoming partners in law firms

There has been a slow move to make up barristers as partners in legal disciplinary practices, Legal Futures can reveal.

Figures from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) indicate that just nine barristers have so far become partners, although we have reason to believe that at least one of these is incorrect and are checking it.

We broke the news that Portia O’Connor of Pegasus Legal Research in the West Midlands was the first barrister confirmed as a partner by the SRA (see story), and have also reported on Nicole Curtis at Penningtons.

Since then, the records – using both the SRA and the Law Society’s Find a Solicitor service (which uses SRA data) – indicate that other partners include: Kevin Charles of Crossland Employment Solicitors in Didcot; Richard Martin, a criminal defence barrister at Knight Polson in Hampshire; Simon Williams at Newcastle-based shipping and international trade firm Mills & Co; Carmen Dowd of Cheshire firm S E Law; and Abdullah Al-Yunusi of criminal law firm MPR Solicitors in Twickenham.

Other firms have announced barrister partners but the SRA records do not yet reflect this: Mills & Reeve has made up Richard Sykes, an education specialist, while US firm Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson intends to appoint James Kitching as a partner once the barrister’s notice period at fellow US firm Bryan Cave is up. Nick Cherryman, a barrister turned solicitor, has already made the switch from Bryan Cave to become a partner.