Practice areas / services
Irwin Mitchell is the largest UK full-service law firm with the following practice areas:
- Agriculture & Rural Business
- Asset Management for Personal Injury
- Banking & Finance
- Business Crime
- Business Immigration
- Charity & Philanthropy
- Commercial
- Commercial Litigation & Dispute Resolution
- Conveyancing & Property
- Corporate
- Costs Team
- Counselling
- Court of Protection
- Crime & Investigations
- Elderly Legal Services
- Employment Law
- Environmental, Social & Governance
- Estate Planning
- Ethical & Sustainable Investing
- Family Law
- Family Offices
- Financial Planning
- Immigration
- In-house Counsel
- Insolvency
- Intellectual Property
- Intergenerational Wealth Management
- Investment Management
- Landed Estates
- Legal Helpline
- Medical Negligence Claims
- Pensions
- Personal Injury Claims
- Probate
- Protecting Your Rights
- Real Estate
- Regulatory & Compliance
- Retirement Financial Planning
- Succession Planning
- Tax
- Tax Planning
- Wills, Trusts & Estates
- Wills, Trust & Estate Disputes
Chambers and Partners, a leading analyst of the legal market, has awarded Irwin Mitchell its highest ‘Band 1’ ranking for the following departments: Court of Protection: Health & Welfare, Court of Protection: Property & Affairs, Personal Injury: Mainly Claimant: Industrial Disease, Product Liability: Mainly Claimant and Travel: International Personal Injury (Claimant). See here for more information
Key sectors / industries
Irwin Mitchell serves a range of sectors, with its most notable clients operating in the following sectors:
In addition, Irwin Mitchell also services the following industries: Agriculture & Rural Business, Retail, Leisure & Hospitality, Education, Landed Estates, Sport, and Technology & Communication.
Work
Some of Irwin Mitchell’s most notable work includes:
- Lucas Whitehouse: The firm achieved a £35.5 million settlement for the family of Lucas Whitehouse, who had sustained a brain injury during his birth. The settlement will fund the specialist lifetime care, therapies and support Lucas requires and will be managed by the firm’s Court of Protection team to ensure it lasts for the remainder of his life.
- Bristol Protestors: The firm’s Public Law and Human Rights department secured damages and a formal apology on behalf of protestors known as the ‘Colston Four’ for their unlawful arrest.
- Lucy Letby Victims: Irwin Mitchell’s medical negligence lawyers represented a number of the parents whose children were killed by Lucy Letby between June 2015 and June 2016.
- Coronation Street: The firm has regularly advised scriptwriters at ITV on various storylines within Coronation Street which involve legal aspects, to ensure that the proposed storylines are legally accurate.
Offices / global footprint / expansion
Headquarters: Sheffield, Riverside East.
Offices: The firm has 17 offices across the UK including in Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Chichester, Gatwick, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Middlesborough, Newbury, Newcastle, Reading and Southampton.
Insights, internships and other opportunities
Irwin Mitchell offers five apprenticeships: Accounting, Audit, Business Administration, Paralegal and Solicitor.
The firm also offers a one-week Legal Work Placement scheme from which anyone who completes the placement is automatically considered for a training contract, and this is the main way in which training contracts are awarded. The placement provides the opportunity to get an insight into the firm’s work as well as participate in inductions, social activities, breakfast meetings and community centric initiatives.
The firm also runs and attends a variety of virtual events, which provide further insight into the firm and its work. Recent examples include attending the Legal Cheek Virtual Law Fair and the All About Law Virtual Law Fair, as well as running its own virtual events. The firm also has a fortnightly podcast providing updates and advice on a variety of topics which matter to the firm’s clients. Click here to find out more.
Training contract
In total, the firm recruits between 45- 50 trainees per intake, across 11 locations. The firm offers training contracts in Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Chichester, Gatwick, Leeds, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield and Southampton.
The firm’s training contract offers trainees the opportunity to sit in either three or four seats over the two years. Trainees have the opportunity to choose from seven client service areas, including commercial advisory and disputes, complex personal injury, corporate and finance, court of protection and public law, family law, private client services, and property.
The firm actively engages with future trainees, allocating them a buddy and inviting them to events before the start of their training contracts.
Secondments
The firm does not offer either client or international secondments.
Technology and innovation
Irwin Mitchell states that technology is a “big part” of its strategy for the future. The firm is “always improving” what it does and how it does it. This is evidenced by the following examples:
- The Legal Tech Book: Two specialists from Irwin Mitchell contributed to this book on how the law firm has tackled the cybersecurity issues faced by colleagues and clients. The two specialists co-authored a piece entitled “Cybersecurity: Myths and the Hero’s Journey” which drew on Greek mythology to examine some of the Herculean tasks faced by modern businesses when it comes to cybersecurity and the road to success.
- Partnership with Advanced – Irwin Mitchell have partnered with Advanced to manage its IT services, central IT service desk, data centres, workplace services, appllications and hardware to better support the firm transform its client experience and service delivery.
- HOST partnership: in 2021, the firm partnered with innovation hub, HOST, to provide specialist legal advice to technology businesses in the North West. The partnership allowed HOST to have direct access to pro bono legal advice from Irwin Mitchell’s media and innovation team.
Corporate social responsibility
Irwin Mitchell has a “long-standing commitment” to support its local communities through fundraising, volunteering and providing pro bono legal advice. Examples of this work include:
- AvMA Helpline: The firm’s employees from its national medical negligence team volunteer for the Action Against Medical Accidents (AvMA) helpline, which provides advice on a wide range of healthcare issues.
- LawWorks’ Welfare Benefits Advocacy Project: This project supports some of the most vulnerable people in society with appeals to the Social Security Tribunal in relation to welfare benefit applications. The firm has supported this initiative since 2019 and advised clients with appeals relating to Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), Personal Independence Payments (PIP) and Universal Credit.
- The Irwin Mitchell Charities Foundation: The foundation was founded in 1997 and raises money and provides support to various charities. Since its foundation, it has managed to donate over £3 million to good causes.
- ESG: What’s Now & What’s Next Report: The firm is helping its clients to tackle Environmental, Social and Governance concerns. The hyperlinked report involves experts from the firm explaining ten of the most pressing obstacles it believes clients will need to tackle in order to meet ESG targets.
- Flexible by Choice: employees of the firm are able to work flexibly through the firm’s approach entitled “Flexible by Choice.” This means that employees are able to choose when and where they work, whether it’s at home, at one of the firm’s 17 offices, or on the go. This strategy has been reinforced since the pandemic and enables the firm to provide better work/life balance as well as contribute to its Responsible Business strategy.
Diversity and inclusion
The firm is striving to create an inclusive workplace, where all colleagues feel “a sense of belonging and are enabled to thrive”. Examples of related initiatives include:
- D&I Networks: all employees of Irwin Mitchell are welcome to join the firm’s D&I networks and their events. All of these groups feed into the firm’s overall D&I Board and strategy. The networks include IM Powered (gender equality), IM Equal (LGBT+), IM Respect (ethnicity, culture and faith), IM Aspiring (social mobility), IM Able (disability and long-term health conditions) and IM Generations (age-related and generational).
- UK Model Diversity Survey: The firm was one of the foundation law firm participants in the UK Model Diversity Survey, which produces annual data on diversity. This helps the firm to maintain its commitment to improving the diversity of its workforce.
- The Halo Code: as part of Black History Month in 2021, the firm adopted the Halo Code, which helps employers to be more proactively inclusive towards African-Caribbean employees and colleagues who wear their hair naturally.
- Ethnicity Pay Gap Figures: The firm regularly publishes data on its pay gap figures.