Jane is Head of the Employment team at Fox Williams. She is immensely experienced and equally at home advising employers or senior employees. Clients benefit from her strong technical expertise coupled with her extensive management and business experience. Jane believes that the defining characteristic of a good employment lawyer is the ability to adapt to the particular requirements of a client’s situation. Sometimes a conciliatory approach is required sometimes a highly tactical and determined approach. A judgement has to be made in any given situation as to the best way of proceeding. Jane's employer clients (who are now largely drawn from the City) benefit from her ability to provide pragmatic and commercial solutions to difficult employment law problems. Jane also advises partners and partnerships on issues involving individual partners.
She is particularly effective at defending and pursuing employment litigation. In the past couple of years Jane acted for newly formed Vestra Wealth LLP who were sued by UBS AG when more than 70 of their employees decided to move to Vestra and she defended Chelsea Football Club when it was sued in the employment tribunal by its former director Paul Smith. In the past Jane advised Deutsche Morgan Grenfell on the departure of Nicola Horlick, Dulwich College on the departure of its headmaster Anthony Verity, John Charman on his departure from ACE Insurance and the establishment of Axis Insurance and Chelsea Football Club on proceedings brought by its former director and owner Ken Bates.
Jane is ranked as a leading individual in both the 2009/10 Chambers Guide to the legal profession and the Legal 500 directory. She is praised for her "clever ideas" in the Legal 500. Chambers Guide says that Jane "wins praise for her great attention to detail and skills in severance and discrimination claims." She is also recommended in the 2009/2010 international guide "Who's Who Legal" and in PLC's “Which Lawyer? 2009”.
Jane sits on the Management Committee of the City HR Association (www.city-hr.co.uk) and is Chair of its Best Practice Committee which has produced written guidance for City employers on the information and consultation regulations, age discrimination legislation, bullying and harassment and diversity and discrimination law. She is also a member of the board of directors of Devonshire House Management Club for senior management/HR professionals. Jane regularly comments in the media and speaks at conferences on employment law issues. She spoke about gender inequality at the City HR Association's 2009 conference on Re-building the City: HR's role in organisational revival.
In 1992 Jane co-founded the Employment Lawyers’ Association (www.elaweb.org.uk) and was its first Secretary. She served on the management committee for a decade and was Chairman from 2000 to 2002, during which time she played a significant role in building up the Association to become the principal representative body for UK employment lawyers. Jane is a member of the Employment Law Sub-Committee of the City of London Law Society and a former Treasurer of the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association. She is a member of the International Bar Association’s employment and discrimination committees.
Jane has experience of handling cross-border employment law issues, working with overseas law firms in Fox Williams’ international network and other “best friend” firms and is a regular speaker at international conferences held by the International Bar Association and the European Employment Lawyers Association (EELA). She led a panel discussion at the EELA's 2009 conference in Holland on the impact of the financial crisis on employment law and practice in Europe.
Jane has been a partner at Fox Williams since 1994. Prior to that she was a partner at Denton Hall having established their employment department from scratch. She studied law at Girton College, Cambridge and trained at McKenna & Co where she gained her initial experience as an employment and immigration law specialist. During the course of her career she has advised clients in nearly every business sector.
