National giant Eversheds has hired Hammond Suddards Edge partner Julia Edwards to boost its Birmingham employment and pensions team.
Edwards will take up the appointment after a six-month notice period, to expire at the end of November.
Edwards is the second former Edge Ellison partner this week to announce they are to quit Hammonds for Eversheds. Partner Stuart Fleet will leave the Hammonds City office to join Eversheds’ corporate team later this month (Legal Week 14 June).
Edwards denied the move was sudden. “The opportunity came up and it was the right time to take it,” she said. “I was with Edge (now Hammond Suddards Edge) for ten years and now it’s time for a change.”
Edwards’ departure will leave the Hammonds Birmingham employment team with two partners, Birmingham senior partner James Retallack and Veronica Dean.
Retallack denied the move would damage the standing of the Hammonds employment team in the Birmingham market. “Clearly we’re losing a senior member of the team which is disappointing, but given the size of the local and national team I don’t think the implications are enormous”, he said. “We’ll continue to be at the top of the tree.”
The appointment will bring the number of partners in the Eversheds Birmingham employment and pensions team to six. Associates Paul Cotton, Kim Howells and Karen Macpherson were all promoted to the partnership in May 2001.
Edwards qualified at Edge Ellison in 1992, and was made partner in 1998. She covers all areas of employment law, including sexual, racial, and disability discrimination, unfair dismissal, contractual claims and injunctive proceedings.
She is a member of the Employment Lawyers Association and the Association of Women Solicitors.
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