Everys welcomes animal welfare and meat industry law specialist
Everys welcomes animal welfare and meat industry law specialist
Meat Management columnist and meat industry law specialist Jamie Foster, has joined Everys Solicitors.
Jamie Foster (left) and James Griffin.
Solicitor-Advocate Foster is the UK’s leading legal expert in animal welfare and countryside sports defence cases while also specialising in trading standards, health & safety and environmental investigations, and regulation of the meat trade, including the halal meat industry.
He joins Everys from Clarke Willmott to team up with the firm’s managing partner James Griffin to form a specialist agricultural, rural and countryside sports department that will be known as Foster & Griffin.
Hunting Act and firearms law specialist Mr Griffin, who is also a trustee of the East Devon Hunt and committee member of the Devon Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, said: “Jamie and I often used to face each other in court over cases involving the rural community. He was a tough opponent and one I respect enormously.”
Foster trained in London and worked on a number of high profile crime cases before moving into regulatory law and re-locating to the South West. Seven years ago, he became the Countryside Alliance’s solicitor and since then has attended 80 per cent of Hunting Act cases across the UK. He co-wrote Law of Field Sports in 2010; the first book on the Game Act 1831 for the best part of a century.
Foster has also worked with 65% of the UK’s abattoirs to guide them through what is a highly regulated area of the meat industry.
“James and I have always been good friends,” said Foster. “I have always wanted to work with him if I could. This opportunity arose and will enable us to give farmers, landowners, people that work with animals or participate in country sports a place where they know they can come and people will understand their legal needs in a welcoming environment.”
He added: “We are a full service law firm by meeting all the legal needs people have but as we are firmly rooted in the countryside that is where our sympathies, passions and energies will always lie.”
Foster will be based at Everys’ Honiton branch but will serve the needs of clients across the UK and overseas.
