First Senior Counsel for Tax, appointed in 2018
Ed has a broad practice covering corporation tax, VAT and stamp taxes, with a particular emphasis on the real estate and oil and gas sectors and an increasing involvement in matters involving the life insurance tax regime. Ed has extensive experience of corporate transactions in these and other sectors, regularly advising on high profile deals.
Recent highlights include advising:
- abrdn on various aspects of its new strategic partnership with Phoenix Group Holdings
- UK Asset Resolution on the sale of a £5bn asset portfolio to a consortium comprising Davidson Kempner and Citibank
- Petrogas and HitecVision on the proposed acquisition of a portfolio of upstream oil and gas assets from Total for a base consideration of USD635 million
- Ovo Energy, the UK’s leading independent energy supplier, in connection with its purchase of SSE plc’s GB household energy and services business
- Dobbies Garden Centres, the UK’s leading garden centre operator, on the acquisition of 31 garden centres from Wyevale Garden Centres (the acquisition increases Dobbies’ estate to 69 centres)
- Legal & General on the sale of its Mature Savings business to Swiss Re for £650 million
Ed counts several major UK property investors amongst his clients, including Canary Wharf and Derwent London. More generally, Ed advises UK Asset Resolution Limited (particularly in relation to the various disposals it has undertaken of the B&B and Northern Rock mortgage books); Standard Life Aberdeen (now abrdn plc, for whom he acted in relation to its merger with Aberdeen Asset Management in 2017 and the sale of its insurance business to Phoenix Group Holdings in 2018); and the retail-focused private investment business Midlothian Capital Partners on various acquisitions.
Ed speaks at conferences and contributes to tax journals and industry publications on the specialities described above.