Ben Staveley, a former partner in the Freshfields Tax Department, is now a writing and drafting consultant and the author of The Language of Contracts. He shares how his journey at Freshfields shaped his career and inspired his mission to help lawyers avoid contract disputes.
As the first in his family to attend university, Ben began studying English literature at Cambridge before switching to fast-track law. ‘I had been told that Freshfields was the best firm I could get, if I could get in.’ He joined as an articled clerk in 1979, among a cohort of 15, six of whom went on to become partners at the firm. Of those who didn’t stay at Freshfields, one went off to run the tax department at another firm and another became very successful doing offshore legal work. The group, now known as the ‘class of ’79,’ still meets regularly.
Ben likens tax law to bomb disposal: ‘You start off by being given something big and round with a fuse in it. (Then) you get things that are slightly more disguised and harder to spot. And the longer you go through your career the bigger and more complicated the bombs become, and you are still required to defuse them before they explode into an unexpected tax bill.’
A series of ‘UK firsts’
Reflecting on his Freshfields career, Ben recalls the 1986 Big Bang—a pivotal moment that reshaped the financial sector. It enabled mergers among financial clients and paved the way for American multinational banks to establish themselves in London. For Ben and his team, this came with the exciting challenge of working out how to do in London the kind of transactions the banks had been doing in New York. Highlights included pioneering the first UK mortgage securitisation and the first UK building society securitisation.
The scariest room at Freshfields
As a partner, Ben prioritised trainee development and broke with Freshfields tradition by sharing his room with a trainee. This offered the trainees a firsthand view of how a partner communicates with clients, manages their workload and how they discuss matters with associates who come in with a problem. It might have seemed daunting to trainees, but it paid off—the first three trainees who sat with Ben all went on to become partners. He fondly recalls his time later sharing a room with another tax partner, Sarah Falk. Together, they mentored trainees by inviting them to share an office with them both—the ‘scariest room in Freshfields’. Sarah is now a Court of Appeal judge, one of two (with Philippa Whipple) who worked in the Freshfields tax department.
From tax partner to recruiter
When Ben stepped down as a partner to focus on his family, he chose not to leave Freshfields entirely. ‘I wanted to stop being a tax lawyer in practice, but I didn't want to leave the firm…It was a family and it sort of remained a family because even though it grew, I sort of grew with it.’ He transitioned to trainee recruitment and professional support within the tax department, maintaining his connection to the firm.
Reflecting on progress in equality, diversity and social mobility in recruitment, Ben notes how far law firms have come since 1979, when in Ben’s intake Freshfields hired 10 Oxford or Cambridge men and one woman from Exeter, Penny Curtis, ‘probably the most able of us all.’ Today, Freshfields ranks 10th in the UK Social Mobility Index.
The Language of Contracts
Ben’s background in English Literature resurfaced as he helped the firm’s trainees to improve their writing and drafting skills. He became more and more interested in how the firm was writing its advice and drafting contracts for clients, which sparked a decade-long career as a writing and drafting consultant for law firms and other companies.
Ben emphasises that drafting is a critical skill requiring the same rigorous analysis as the law itself. ‘If you read decided cases about contract disputes, you see hopeless drafting that law firms, including reputable law firms, are putting out on a daily basis.’ The few uncertain words that bring the contract into dispute often lead to the discovery of many other parts of the contract that could have fallen into dispute, illustrating that the contract was rotten throughout. Over recent years, Ben has studied these issues to produce a practical guide for drafters, The Language of Contracts, ‘because no lawyer wants to end up with their contract in dispute before a court.’
Ben’s book highlights common pitfalls in drafting and guides readers on how to identify and fix issues—whether in their own work or in contracts drafted by others—before signing, to prevent disputes later.