Moving on

Private practicePartnersIn what was presumably a burst of sunshine-inspired generosity, the big firms this week competed to outdo each other in terms of large-scale partnership promotions.Leading the pack was global firm Baker & McKenzie, which made up an impressive 50 partners worldwide, taking its partnership to a whopping 618.

The seven based in London are Ross Denton (EU competition and trade), James Richards (corporate), Ellen Temperton (employment), Stephen Turner (property) and Ian Jack, Bernard Sharp and Annie Williams (all banking and finance).Addleshaw Booth & Co has promoted 13 of its solicitors to partner, taking its total to 128: Rob Holmes, Yunus Seedat and Jim Tully (corporate finance); Charles Jagger (property litigation); James Whittaker and Michael Lowry (intellectual property); Nancy McGuire (construction); Jenny Cromack (commercial lending); Sally Butt (finance litigation); James Preece (commercial and insurance litigation); Rob Riley (employment); Rachel Tunnicliffe (trusts and tax), and Philip Way (family).Not to be left out, Morgan Cole now has 92 partners after five promotions: Rob Cherry (private acquisitions and disposals), Guy Constant (company/banking), Joanne Davies (employment), Philip Jones (dispute management) and Amanda Wooding (commercial litigation).There were a number of double promotions this week, with Cheltenham firm Bretherton Price Elgoods appointing Theresa Adamson (commercial), and Robyn Roberts (commercial property) to give it 18 partners.City-based Pritchard Englefield has promoted Gitta Altmann (corporate) and Edward John (litigation) to take the number of partners to 25.

Birmingham firm Needham & James has appointed Richard Cox - previously an in-house lawyer for Powergen - as partner in its commercial property department.

Duncan Graham, formerly head of insolvency at Yorkshire firm Denison Till, is joining East Anglian-based Mills & Reeve as head of insolvency and business recovery.Linklaters & Alliance is building its tax practice in Madrid with the addition of transaction tax specialist Nicols Martin, a former partner with KPMG Abogados.Ashurst Morris Crisp has expanded its tax practice in its Paris office with partner Catherine Charpentier from US firm Coudert Brothers.Leaving Ashursts in the UK is competition partner Neil Baylis, who has joined the London office of Osborne Clarke.Also in the City, CMS Cameron McKenna has a new head for its telecoms team with the recruitment of David Roberts, who was general counsel at Nortel Networks.

At the same time, current partner Richard Eccles is relocating from Brussels to the London office to specialise in telecoms and EC regulatory issues.Ince & Co has hired shipping partner Graham Crane from niche firm Constant & Constant.Jason Austin has joined Eversheds' Manchester office to head the office's IT and e-commerce group.

He was previously at Garretts where he led the northern technology group.Kent firm Cripps Harries Hall has appointed Jane Ryland, previously at Laytons' Bristol office, as a partner and head of the construction group.Dorking-based Downs has recruited residential property partner Alison Baldwin from City firm Teacher Stern Selby, and made up family lawyer Andrew Christmas.

It now has nine partners.

Private practiceAssociates/AssistantsTwo of the firms with double partnership appointments have done the same at the next level down: Bretherton Price Elgoods has brought in Sandy Sadhra (litigation), from the in-house team at GE Capital in Bristol, and Kim Boettcher (corporate), previously at Streathers in London.

Carole Watts, a clinical negligence and personal injury lawyer, has joined Pritchard Englefield as an assistant from East Anglian-based Cunningham John, and Lindsay Hall has joined the employment department as an assistant after completing her training at Nabarro Nathanson.

Continuing the double appointments theme, Leeds firm Lupton Fawcett has promoted Euan McConnell to senior associate and recruited Simon Warburton, previously at Thomas Eggar Church Adams, as an assistant.

Birmingham firm Williamson & Soden has promoted employment specialist Scott Withers, and commercial and property lawyer Kevin Reilly to associates.Northants-based Vincent Sykes & Higham has recruited tax and succession planning expert Ryan Hawthorn from Hewitson Becke & Shaw, while New Zealand lawyer Melissa Higham has joined the commercial department from the Generics Group.Elsewhere, Osborne Clarke has boosted its competition practice in the Bristol home office with associate Stephanie Rickard from Nabarro Nathanson.Clinical negligence specialist Sheila Riches joins south-east firm ASB law as an assistant from Russell & Co in Crawley.West Midlands firm Challinors Lyon Clark has recruited Linda McGrath, an employment lawyer previously at Birmingham firm Young & Lee, as an assistant in its newly established business support team.

CORRECTIONAlison Bluck, formerly an associate at Osborne Clarke's Bristol office, has been appointed an associate and head of insolvency across all of Laytons' offices, not as stated in [2001] Gazette, 5 July, 10.