‘I understand that being an owner manager can be an isolating task,’ Jeff Hartstone tells Spear’s. ‘I act as a sounding board for clients’ worries, queries and ambitions, fostering trust and loyalty. Absolute trust and confidentiality are key.’ Hartstone is one of BKL’s longest-standing partners, with more than 30 years’ experience in the private client world. He has served as managing partner and senior partner. ‘I’ve helped to lead the firm through many economic changes and ambitious periods of growth,’ he says. He has a treasure trove of insights to help his clients, who are made up of high-growth clients, largely from the real estate world.

Jonathan Burt’s practice has ‘somewhat expanded’ at Harbottle & Lewis since the arrival of contentious trusts expert and joint litigation head Sofie Hoffman from Edmonds Marshall McMahon in February. ‘I’ve seen the expansion of the ambit of what I can do over trust disputes and 1975 [Inheritance] Act claims,’ he says. A former managing director of Barclays’ trust companies, Burt is a deft hand at analysing the impact of varying factors on his clients. ‘My clients are looking for pragmatic and practical solutions to the efficient structuring of their investments,’ he explains. ‘Getting clients to understand the outcome of a complicated area of the law like tax is a rare skill.’

Ashley Crossley’s UHNW business clients are normally worth at least $400 million and often have a Middle Eastern connection. He advises them on extracting and investing funds, and occasionally on personal matters such as yachts. Crossley remains calm over the current economic situation. ‘It would not be sensible to increase the tax burden at the moment,’ he says. ‘The government may have to level up National Insurance for self-employed people, but I’m not expecting any significant tax rises.’ Nor does he detect any attack on the res-non-dom regime. ‘The UK will not want to put off entrepreneurs and businesses investing here through those types of arrangements,’ he says.

Andrew Goldstone established Mishcon de Reya’s formidable tax and wealth planning group more than 15 years ago, and he continues to lead its tax group and advise on all aspects of UK and offshore matters. ‘Our associates are busier than ever,’ he tells Spear’s. ‘People are sorting out their personal affairs and there’s still no shortage of demand from international clients.’ An expert on philanthropy and charitable trusts, Goldstone has seen a ‘continuing flow’ of new instructions to set up charities over the lockdown period. ‘Those with money are increasingly seeing what good they can do with it because they’re seeing the need,’ he says.

‘The accountancy world over the last 20 years has become more automated,’ says Ben Grist. ‘Where you can add value for clients is areas like tax, because everyone feels very personal about tax.’ Add value he does. Grist has become a general adviser for HNW clients, on everything from simple filings to estate planning and more complex questions. ‘I like it because it means you’re dealing directly with clients,’ he says. ‘You start off just talking about taxes, and that brings in lots of questions about how families work, how wealth gets passed down… You go above and beyond the technical question of “what’s my tax bill?”. And that’s what I love to do, speak to real people.’

‘I act for a range of high and ultra-high net worth UK and international clients,’ says James Heathcote. He started the specialised Private Client Advisory department at Lancaster Knox in 2019, ‘with few clients, but big ambitions to create a dynamic and differentiated offering’. Heathcote has advised ‘some of the largest, most influential and most recognisable names in the private client world’, ranging from business owners to landed estates. Many of his clients come from bigger firms, seeking a more tailored and director-led approach. ‘We’ve far exceeded all our expectations,’ he says of the department, adding that it is on track to expand in 2021 and enjoy ‘a really strong second year’.

‘It’s all about succession planning, estate planning, preparing families for change,’ Catherine Hill tells Spear’s of the work that’s been keeping her busy over lockdown. A partner in Forsters’ private client team, Hill devises holding structures for family wealth and establishes family investment companies. Her personal interest in the subject and referred clients led her to act for ‘significant’ landed estates of artists and collectors in a sector that carries unique nuances in such matters. ‘Whether it’s advice or copyright or help setting up business structures, it’s turned into a real industry,’ she says. ‘It’s probably the fastest-growing part of my business.’

Rawlinson & Hunter partner Paul Huggins counts everyone from hedge fund managers to Formula One racers as clients, whom he gives ‘specific bespoke advice’ on a broad range of tax matters. A specialist in the UK’s statutory residence test, remittance basis users and the taxation of ‘mixed funds’, he heads up the firm’s London department and its employment solutions team. ‘My strongest attribute is being able to translate complex advice into simple material that a client can digest,’ says Huggins. He aims for ‘simplicity and clarity’ when advising clients – no mean feat given the UK’s ‘incredibly complex’ tax system, which is ‘changing on a fairly regular basis’.

Alice Killingbeck’s career was straight out of the gate after qualifying. She started at Barclays Wealth, where she became interested in the Middle Eastern market. ‘The idea is to provide integrated multidisciplinary advice to HNW and UHNW clients,’ she says. However, this year all private client practitioners found themselves in a completely unforeseen situation. Throughout the pandemic, Killingbeck has seen surges in wills and estate planning, and themes such as philanthropy also came to the fore. ‘Clients have been more keen than ever to enshrine their values in robust legal governance frameworks,’ she says.

The straight-talking Sue Laing provides succession and tax planning advice to HNW families, particularly in private businesses and UK landed estates. ‘This is going to hurt,’ she says of the fallout from coronavirus. ‘I don’t think anybody expects anything other than rises in tax. Inheritance tax and capital gains tax are a very small part of the overall tax take, so some people think it won’t go up. I think it would be politically almost impossible for the chancellor not to raise those rates.’ International planning has become more complex, but ‘you can still achieve long-term tax savings, and you can still devolve your assets in the way you want to’.

‘I place great emphasis on getting to know what each family needs and what will be appropriate and flexible for them in the future,’ says Caroline Le Jeune in her mission statement. She has overseen succession planning advisory at BDO and specialised in chartered tax advisory at PwC for a decade. A qualified solicitor, she joined Blick Rothenberg in 2014, where she now focuses on international families. Le Jeune helps HNWs structure offshore assets and find the best tax jurisdictions should the need to move arise. Her specialisms include onshore and offshore trusts, tax issues that arise from separation, divorce and family disputes, as well as intergenerational planning

‘We have geopolitical risks in various pockets of the world at the moment, and that means that the UHNW community is thinking ever more carefully about structuring options,’ observes Piers Master, who’s received an influx of asset structuring enquiries recently, particularly from the Middle East. Master is a go-to adviser for a range of tax matters from trust to succession and estate planning. He leads the international group of Charles Russell Speechlys’ private wealth arm. He often asks clients to consider the matrimonial landscape of a country before migrating there. ‘I would ask what state their marriage is in, and they sometimes raise an eyebrow or two,’ he laughs.

‘In the financial crisis people were worried about losing their money. This time not only are they worried about losing their money, they’re also worried about losing their lives,’ Clare Maurice tells Spear’s. The highly personable Maurice is sage-like on issues of international tax and estate planning. Continuity planning, residence, passports, property assets, trusts and structures have all been on the minds of clients during lockdown. Several of these issues were prevalent before, she says, but Covid-19 has added a ‘slightly different lens’. ‘It’s fundamentally about what families want to achieve,’ she says. ‘And things like the pandemic bring this into sharp relief.’

Rosamond McDowell’s ‘mixed practice’ is about half onshore and half offshore, dealing with wealth, tax, death and planning-related issues. Her clients are global in their geography and eclectic in their backgrounds, but she does, she says, gravitate towards clients she gets on with personally. ‘My theory on private client work is that you end up advising people who get on with you and like you. It’s symbiotic,’ she says. As for Covid and the road ahead, McDowell doesn’t like to speculate. However, she ‘can’t imagine any government, whether it’s Tory or Labour, wanting to introduce a new tax just at the moment when everybody’s desperate for money to start flowing again’.

The personable and engaging David Mellor believes the tax code is overdue a major simplification. ‘I try hard to avoid jargon,’ he states. ‘We are dealing with complicated things. Clients have really got to understand what we are suggesting, getting to grips with it rather than just being accepting of the advice.’ Mellor has an acute understanding of what clients appreciate when it comes to achieving their objectives. This approach helps with complex issues in taxation, where he works especially on inheritance and capital gains tax, corporate tax and VAT. He is also an expert in advising renewable energy businesses operating in the UK.

‘I’m very lucky,’ says Patricia Milner of her ‘mixed practice’. She advises single and multi-family offices and professionals, most of whom have a UK connection. The Withers partner foresees changes. ‘A significant amount of finances are being pumped into the economy, which means that at some stage the current tax regime will have to change,’ she says. She has seen clients’ priorities shifting: ‘A focus on many families’ minds is succession planning. They are focusing very much on family and what is important to them.’ But it’s not all doom and gloom: ‘ESG investing has really gathered momentum in the last 12 months, and possibly even more so post-pandemic.’

A partner in Mishcon de Reya’s private client team and a visiting international law professor at King’s College London, Filippo Noseda is a man used to being at the cutting edge of his profession. He is currently heading up a team acting for a US-born British citizen who is crowdfunding an appeal against HMRC’s decision to disclose her confidential financial data to the US authorities under FATCA. ‘We are the first firm to have advised on a legal challenge to the global mandatory disclosure rules, which many see as a direct infringement of personal privacy and human rights,’ says the firm. Noseda appeared in the European Parliament last year to address concerns with FATCA and the CRS.

A partner in Smith & Williamson’s private client tax services Birmingham outpost, Julia Rosenbloom has been busy guiding clients through the twists and turns of recent months. A non-practising solicitor, she covers both corporate and personal tax perspectives on matters including tax, intergenerational wealth planning and property structuring. ‘There’s lots of interesting things happening in the tax world at the moment, lots of upcoming changes,’ she says of the current landscape. Rosenbloom’s practice is decidedly non-prescriptive. ‘You have to get into a client’s shoes and understand how they want to work,’ she says.

Nick Rucker’s client list ranges ‘from the modestly wealthy to the UHNW’, and he relishes the variety. ‘They [clients] tend to be complex,’ he says, ‘but it is surprising how often more modest clients, who aren’t as high-profile, can be just as interesting and profitable.’ The former investment and private banker, who also possesses experience in corporate law, doesn’t see himself as ‘just a tax lawyer’. His experience is a boon to clients, who seek his advice on the commercial, business and entrepreneurial aspects of their lives, assets and companies. ‘We specialise in complexity and problem solving but we do not obsess about international work or ultra-wealth,’ he has said.

Simon Rylatt has an international practice at Boodle Hatfield, where he advises UHNW individuals, families and trusts who have high-value affairs across jurisdictions such as Switzerland and the US. Rylatt, who was nominated for Tax & Trust Lawyer of the Year at the 2019 Spear’s Wealth Management Awards, has a strong reputation on the contentious side, though he prefers solutions everybody can live with. He doesn’t operate solely as a tax and trust lawyer for his clients, as relationships naturally deepen. ‘As part of your advisory role, you do get involved in other aspects of their lives,’ he has previously told Spear’s.

Nimesh Shah, 38, took the reins as CEO of Blick Rothenberg earlier this year, but seems undaunted by the task ahead of him at the 600-person firm. He tells Spear’s that one of his aims is to continue building relationships with entrepreneurs, many of whom come from the tech sector and work with Blick Rothenberg all the way from the start-up stage of their business through to a successful exit. Another aim is to use technology to make processes easier for clients. ‘But,’ he warns, ‘I don’t want us to become robots. The core of Blick Rothenberg is that we are a private client firm.’ That means personal interaction and relationships are crucial

Sonal Shah’s star is rising in the complex tax and trusts landscape, especially where ‘complicated family dynamics’, long-standing trust matters, succession planning and cross-border issues are involved. She also has significant experience in heritage property, associated trusts and double taxation. The senior associate has a particular interest in the Middle East and intergenerational wealth transfer, and clients range from senior executives and entrepreneurs to owners and trustees of landed estates and inherited wealth, as well as international families. Shah has been with Farrer & Co since joining as a trainee in 2007.

Highly regarded among the Spear’s network, Chris Shepard has looked after the tax affairs of families with both inherited and newly acquired wealth for 30 years. A partner at Smith & Williamson since 1996, Shepard often deals with probate matters and estate and tax planning. He also specialises in matters relating to trusts, philanthropy, succession planning and wills. One question he often faces is at what point the children of an HNW client should receive their inheritance. ‘It is a question of giving them enough to take responsibility, but not too much that they completely go off the rails and become dependent,’ he has previously said.

Lisa Spearman has described her approach to her work as ‘about making complex issues easy to understand’. It’s not as simple a proposition as one might assume, given her field is full of complicated detail. But with more than 30 years’ experience, Spearman, who has been a partner at Mercer & Hole since 2003, understands the fundamentals of client service. Spearman advises HNWs on all tax matters and leads the firm’s specialised team focused on UK non-doms. ‘We don’t blind people with science,’ she has told Spear’s. ‘What clients need to understand is what the issue is for them and the options available for solving it – and the pros and cons of each.’

Emily Stoneham is ‘an outstanding young contentious trusts lawyer’, according to Payne Hicks Beach. She joined the firm from Macfarlanes in 2017 and was promoted to senior associate earlier this year. Her colleagues enthuse that Stoneham has recently played ‘a critical role’ in many of their biggest cases, independently manages her own caseload and ‘plays an active part’ in the wider private client industry. Her varied practice also covers probate disputes and commercially nuanced cases. She has recently worked on applications for the removal of trustees, challenging wills, and claims for unfair prejudice.

James Walker joined haysmacintyre as a private client tax partner in late 2019 from Buzzacott. He began his career in the Channel Islands, working in the tax teams of two fiduciary services companies and qualifying as both a chartered accountant and chartered tax adviser. Walker has specific knowledge of how the UK taxes non-UK domiciled HNWs, offshore trust/ company structures and related beneficiaries. ‘My clients tend to have wealth they’d like to ensure is available for their future generations, which can involve the use of “offshore” structures and complex planning to marry up financial and personal goals,’ he says.

Wendy Walton is one of BDO’s key figures, having climbed the ranks since starting as a trainee. ‘I decided I wanted to be a partner almost immediately,’ she says. At first her role was focused on UK individuals and families; today, international HNWs with complex tax affairs make up most of her client base. Her strategy is ‘to consider what the client wants to achieve and then work through a plan of how to get there, considering the tax implications along the way’. She now sits as the head of BDO’s global private client services. Walton’s main mission is quite simple: to ‘help HNWs succeed’. Her method is building long-term relationships and ‘bringing new ideas to the table’

With more than 40 years in private practice, Simon Weil’s ‘broader practice’ of private wealth matters is more comprehensive than most. These days, he says, a ‘particular focus’ for him is philanthropy. He’s hopeful that charitable remainder gifts – a way of giving throughout a lifetime without making an outright gift – will be introduced in the UK. ‘If they were introduced in this country it would make a huge difference to the scale of charitable giving,’ he says. Weil has noticed an uptick in interest in giving. ‘Philanthropy is taking off because of the realisation among UHNWs and HNWs that they really owe it to society to do some payback,’ he notes. ‘Covid-19 has only enhanced that.’

Emma White was promoted to partner in Forsters’ private client department in April. She works on a range of complex and crossborder personal taxation and estate planning matters, with particular focus on estate planning for US citizen clients with links to the UK. The past year has been a stand-out for White. She played a pivotal role in numerous big matters, including the commercial sale of music rights on behalf of a British musician and restructuring the ownership of the controlling and majority economic shareholding in a UK listed company. She has also spoken at conferences, including the International Bar Association’s.

Iain Younger’s practice covers ‘a full range of issues’ concerning private clients with ‘proactive, planning-based’ advice based upon ‘a clear understanding of their goals for themselves and their families’. Younger joined Frank Hirth in 2000 and has established and built the trust and estates service within its private client offering. He joined the board of directors in 2016 and covers numerous areas of US and UK taxation and offers specialist advice relating to FATCA reporting. He is also a trustee of NPT-Transatlantic, which deals with effective charitable giving for US and UK-connected individuals and families.

‘If an HNW wants to invest/do business in the US, Basil is the go-to,’ one peer enthused when asked to recommend an international private client lawyer for this index. When Spear’s Zooms the New York/London-based Zirinis, he’s delighted to speak. ‘You have the most sophisticated English law firms, I think – I work with all of them,’ he says. He’s been a partner at Sullivan & Cromwell since 1994. Zirinis has extensive experience in trust and estate litigation. Highlights include US-Bahamas litigation representing Chicago’s Pritzker family, the America’s Cup trust litigation in New York, and ‘a multi-billion-dollar’ trust case in Europe and the Caribbean.