The move follows the appointment by the Department for Education (DfE) to a legal services panel worth an estimated £16 million over three years.
The panel will offer a range of procurement and commercial law advice which could include topics such as contract law, IP, GDPR, and Public Sector Procurement across the DfE Commercial Directorate.
The Mills & Reeve team is looking to recruit at all levels up to partner after securing new government clients and acting on several high-profile projects.
Most recently, the team has advised the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) on a £1.6 billion contract to deliver its second-generation search and rescue aviation programme, UKSAR2G.
The procurement was one of the largest the Government sector team has advised on to date as it revealed a 20 per cent increase in the work it does for Government clients during the financial year to end of May.
Greg Gibson, partner and head of the Government sector, said that the strong growth has continued into the first two months of the current year following recent client wins, prompting the recruitment drive across the firm’s seven UK offices.
Government clients include the Ministry of Defence, the Department of Health & Social Care, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, the Department for Work and Pensions, Homes England, the Government Legal Department and the British Council.
Greg said: “As well as continuing to advise on projects of strategic national importance such as the MCA’s procurement for the UK Second-Generation Search and Rescue Aviation programme, we are increasingly working alongside the Government Legal Department, advising on major policy initiatives.
“Our commitment to delivering outstanding client service on time-critical projects, and our expertise in areas such as public procurement, healthcare law and life sciences, has helped secure several new Government clients and, as a result, we are significantly expanding our team. There are great opportunities for lawyers to join our team to work on interesting projects of national significance and challenging developments in law, policy and regulation.”
Mills & Reeve’s Government sector work covers a wide range of law including competition, construction, corporate, dispute resolution and litigation, employment, information and data protection, information technology intellectual property, planning, projects, procurement, real estate, real estate finance, restructuring and insolvency, retained EU law, tax, charities, education, food, health and healthcare, immigration, life sciences and inquests.
The expansion follows Mills & Reeve’s recent re-appointment as a supplier on Crown Commercial Service’s (CCS) Legal Services Panel.
CCS supports the public sector to achieve maximum commercial value when procuring common goods and services. In 2021/22, CCS helped the public sector to achieve commercial benefits equal to £2.8 billion - supporting world-class public services that offer best value for taxpayers.
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