Having spent the past five years or so patiently watching their corporate colleagues get all the plaudits, litigators are back in fashion. Not only have the corporate bods been largely responsible for the profits splurge the UK’s commercial firms have been dining out on, but they have also been demanding, and getting, international expansion on an unprecedented scale.
Now, of course, those firms with decent litigation departments are thanking their lucky stars they stuck by them during the good times — or at least did not neglect them completely. Even Slaughter and May has been in on the act, thanks to its role as adviser to Unilever in its action against Merrill Lynch, a case that put all but the most hostile take-overs in the shade in terms of press interest.
