Featured Member
Hamish Anderson
How did you first become involved in the world of restructuring and insolvency?
By chance. I was a newly qualified solicitor at Bond Pearce in Plymouth doing general company commercial work when a receivership came in. That case led to another and since being about 3 or 4 years qualified I haven't really done anything else. Of course, the nature of the work has changed greatly over the years - particularly after I joined Norton Rose. At Norton Rose most of my work has been cross-border insolvency work and it is all corporate, but I am glad that I had a good grounding in personal insolvency work as well.
What is the best part of your job?
The unexpected and learning about the inside of different businesses. Clients over the years have included private individuals, corporates, institutions and governments. Most of the time I have acted for IPs, banks and foreign lawyers. Working with foreign lawyers is very stimulating. I am struck how often apparently different insolvency rules produce remarkably similar answers.
What is the most challenging aspect of your job?
Cross-border issues where there are no precedents to follow and no useful academic commentary. UK insolvency work was like that when I started, but it all changed when insolvency became a mainstream subject, which made it a bit less interesting. Cross-border work still has the Wild West appeal!
What character from a novel or film best describes your style of practice?
Indiana Jones.
What is your favourite reported insolvency law case (you can only pick one)?
Of my own cases, HIH (on repatriation of English assets to a foreign liquidation), which we won before a unanimous House of Lords after losing at first instance and before a unanimous Court of Appeal. Those cases are comparatively rare and usually milestones in the development of the law.
If you had not been a lawyer what other job would you have done, would you have enjoyed that job better and would you have been any good at it?
A journalist, and probably not.
What is your most memorable career moment?
Being, with my receiver client, first of all locked out of a factory by a rogue director and then locked in and talking to the press through a first-floor window. The director subsequently went to prison, but that was for fraudulent trading not locking us up.
What do you think are the greatest challenges / changes in our profession in the next 10 years?
Increased regulation and creditor intervention will likely make the job more difficult and increase costs. I think the process of regulation is inexorable and that we are moving away from conduct being dictated by professional ethics towards something based more on compliance. I have doubts about whether that will be for the better in the long run.
What is your favourite novel, film and piece of music?
Put Out More Flags, The Fabulous Baker Boys and Kiri Te Kanawa singing Chants d'Auvergne.
If you were able to repeal or change one insolvency rule or principle, which one would it be and why?
Administration expenses. The drafting of the rules is a disgrace and they threaten the utility of the whole procedure. The pension contributions debacle was an accident waiting to happen.
What do you do in your 'down time'?
Repair things which friends and family have broken.
Jam or marmite?
Clotted cream.
If you were able (and could afford) to retire tomorrow, what would you do?
Cultivate our garden in Cornwall, make things in my workshop, read and interfere in the upbringing of my grandson.
What prompted you to join the ILA and what benefit of membership would you most recommend to someone who is thinking of joining?
I joined the ILA because I was one of its founders and I went on to have the honour of serving as its second president. Of course, we were only just getting off the ground in those days (even the first annual dinner came later) and the ILA has developed so magnificently since then that it is difficult to choose. I think that the emailed technical updates are first rate but I also think that the opportunity to meet fellow insolvency lawyers at the annual conference and to learn from them takes some beating. Peter Totty organised a memorable conference when Gabriel Moss QC presented a paper on fixed charges on book debts which provoked a heated three-way debate with Lord Millett and Professor Sir Roy Goode QC intervening from the floor.
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