The last five years of my career have been the best. I’ve had chunky, exciting work – fraudulent oligarchs, Libyan oil, private equity gone wrong and, ‘Big Bad Pharma.’

Maybe it was AG growing, not me, but the top-quality work seemed to come more easily once I was over 50. I’m an adrenaline addict, and my career has been great. But you just have this moment of clarity: ‘This is crazy; it’s got to stop.’ The demands of the job now in the modern age, you can’t be half in or half out, not as a litigation lawyer.

I always felt that I would retire at the right time. But the real reason I’m going now is that I lost my two closest friends within six months of each other in 2024. One was an M&A partner at this firm and they both coincidentally died of brain haemorrhages. 

My family didn’t have a history in law. My father, who was half Dutch and half Danish, was an international fruit merchant, and so was his father before him. It was my godfather who inspired me to become a lawyer. Most of my parents’ friends were party animals and great fun, whereas he was seen as the serious one. He was still fun, though, very witty.

I was lucky enough to go to Manchester University in the early ’80s – which was a grim time in the UK: unemployment was everywhere and it was all very politicised. The first thing I did, on the advice of a slightly hipper friend from art school, was go to this club called the Hacienda that was just opening. It was a very musical city and it had that slightly rebellious, otherworldly feel to it. There were all sorts of things going on. The miners’ strike, students protesting the nuclear missiles coming into England, attacking Michael Heseltine with red paint, shouting, ‘Better red than dead, Michael!’ 35 years later, as head of our Leeds office – a world away – I did a Teams call with Heseltine about the Northern Powerhouse – marvellous man. The law has taken me on lots of journeys.

The law faculty was fantastic in Manchester; leading experts like Andrew (Lord) Burrows and Margaret and Rodney Brazier were there. But law school in the ’80s was awful. You were dumped a series of books like ‘How to buy a house’ or ‘How to do a will’ and you just memorised them and blurted them out over five days.

‘The law has always attracted iconoclastic people who won’t be put in boxes, have a sense of humour, and are human’

My route into commercial law was as an articled clerk in the late 80s at legacy Simpson Curtis [now part of Pinsent Masons]. I was told to do the completion on an M&A deal where a successful entrepreneur was selling his business to a large, listed company. He was going to accept a huge amount of shares plus millions in cash. I began on the deal on Sunday night and the next day was Black Monday. The drama unfolding was remarkable and showed me how a pen-pushing job could come to life. I have seen an awful lot of crashes in my career – usually good for the litigation department. 

The senior partner at Simpson Curtis was an eccentric character called E. Anthony Blackmore. He had a beautiful way with people and taught me a lot about how it should be done with all clients. He was a director of Liberty of London but could just as easily deal with a West Yorkshire textile owner. 

I left Simpson Curtis because I felt Booth & Co had a better litigation practice and that’s what I wanted to do. There was something that appealed about conflict, being in court and using your wits to judge what’s a good set of evidence and then gambling and pitting your judgement as to who’s going to prevail or when you should back off and do a deal.

As a great believer in direct approaches, I wrote a letter to the head of litigation, John Priestley. He phoned me up and said, ‘You’re not going to mess us around, are you? ’ I said ‘Why would you say that? You don’t even know me.’ It was because he had just had someone from Simpson talking to him in order to get a better salary where he was. And I thought, I like this guy. He and his partners were all the same it turned out – initially slightly scary, direct, great lawyers – and incredibly kind people underneath.

I felt then that to get the best out of me I must be slightly frightened of my boss, and those guys had that. You wanted your first draft letter to be quality so they were impressed by it and for them to keep you on your toes and raise your standards. 

My first international case was when a partner threw me a case involving a children’s book illustrator whose dream was to make his characters come to life so he’d ordered a South Korean toy manufacturer to produce tens of thousands of teddy bears called ‘Mr. Tingle and Mr. Tangle.’ When they arrived he was horrified because, as he put it, the eyes were evil. That is obviously quite a subjective matter under any test of merchantability.

‘There are some lawyers that become really significant big shots but if that goes to your head it can all go wrong’

It’s boring, but I made one choice in 1992 to join Booth & Co, and I have been very happy at a firm that has consistently reinvented itself ever since. The best day of my career was when Addleshaw Booth merged with Theodore Goddard, a firm full of fascinating individuals like music lawyer Paddy Grafton-Green (sadly just passed away) and libel lawyers Martin Kramer and David Engel. The music practice represented Bowie, Nina Simone and the Rolling Stones and the corporate side brought clients like Diageo and ABF, who many years later, still instruct the firm.

A terrible divergence has developed between the culture of success and wealth in some parts of the profession and the under-investment in the court system and delays to criminal justice. Of course, Addleshaws has benefited from this rise in sophistication.

The less good side is the sort of hurry-sickness, where everything has to be done quickly whether it’s the right thing or not. The over-competitiveness leads to a culture in some firms which can be quite unpleasant. The crazy world of the £850/hr associates, recruiters pushing partners for huge commissions and the pressure to deliver returns on the huge salaries.

There are some lawyers that become really significant big shots but if that goes to your head it can all go wrong. If it’s all about the next client that might deliver tens of millions in revenue then all the fun goes out of it. I hope younger lawyers see the sense of fun and lack of pomposity I have believed in. You should, of course, take the job seriously, but remember to laugh out loud too.

I have always deejayed; before Manchester it was punk rock and new wave but I always loved jazz and soul; my dad had a great collection and always had great parties. I thought it would be hopeless if clients could find some Facebook video of me deejaying when I’m meant to be suing people, so I refused to mix the two and kept it secret for years.

It all came crashing down when Addleshaws’ global litigation group came from across the world for a conference in Leeds. I happened to have a gig that night, and was going to slip off at 10 but kept the reason a secret. At 11:30 I thought, ‘this is just silly,’ so I texted three of my friends and told them I was playing just across town if they wanted to come. By midnight, there were 30 members of the litigation practice scratching their heads on the dance floor thinking, ‘Is that really Kamstra behind the decks?’

‘We want lawyers that have space for things outside the law, not just salesman clones’

It is important to do other things while being a lawyer, however hard the hours. I have brought up four wonderful children. I was a director of a contemporary dance company for ten years. I played league cricket for 25 seasons, into my 50s. I mean, Lord Sumption found the time to write a history of the Hundred Years War. We want lawyers that have space for things outside the law, not just salesman clones.

One of my heads of office recently described me as the last of the mavericks, but I hope I’m not; it would be awful if law was not full of mavericks. It has always attracted iconoclastic people who won’t be put in boxes, have a sense of humour, and are human. I hope that never changes. 

When I was younger I was a more rebellious partner; I could see everything wrong with management choices. I was something of a doubter and a challenger, and I’m proud of that. I ended up a board member and, later, global head of litigation, and I have finished my career, leading our 200-law firm Global Connect alliance. Everything has gone so well for the firm; it became the one we dreamt of, back in the noughties – that I never felt the need to leave. We opened offices worldwide, we moved up the client food chain, we became famous for things. Along the way, I realised that being managing partner can be a bed of nails and I admire those who take it on at all; let alone do it well, as ours have. Hats off.

When I retire at the end of April, I don’t want to let go of what I’ve learnt nor the friends I’ve made. I have had quite a long history of work in the arts sector as a director of Phoenix Dance Theatre and there’s more non-profit work I want to do, as well as my own personal artistic endeavours. I think about health again though. In this world of 3,000-hour culture you need to look after yourself. 

You can enjoy your job too much, but you should really be thinking about the last third of your life. 

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