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Melissa Murphy KC, of Landmark Chambers, has been elected as Vice Chair of planning’s specialist Bar association PEBA (the Planning and Environment Bar Association). Over the next two years, she will be working with Tom Cosgrove KC, who has been elected as Chair.
Melissa was previously the elected Equality & Diversity officer on the PEBA committee and over the last two years has promoted a range of access/retention/recruitment initiatives.
Melissa’s specialism is planning and environmental work. She has a proven track record in high profile cases (such as Westferry Printworks, Bramshill, Aylesbury Estate, HS2, Knightland). She has a particular interest in heritage, with clients including The National Trust, the Duke of Northumberland and the Mayor of London/GLA.
Before taking silk, Melissa was the top planning barrister under 35 for two years running, and top three as a senior junior. She is now the most highly ranked female KC in the country (Planning Magazine).
Melissa said: “It is an honour and a privilege to have been elected as PEBA’s Vice Chair. I look forward to a busy two years working on behalf of the Planning Bar: continuing our efforts to make our profession more accessible, and fairer when you get there. We think that is to the benefit of the Bar and the planning industry more widely.
Landmark’s Dr Ashley Bowes becomes Treasurer. Ashley acts for developers, local authorities, landowners and residents’ groups from the planning application stage, through public inquiries and on to litigation in the courts, including to the Supreme Court. He is regularly ranked as a leading practitioner in the directories, where he is described as “having the caselaw at his fingertips”, “a truly talented lawyer” and “very persuasive when conducting advocacy”. Ashley is also the General Editor of Sweet & Maxwell’s Journal of Planning & Environment Law and the author of Oxford University Press’s textbook, A Practical Approach to Planning Law.
Membership of PEBA is open to those practising in the law relating to town and country planning, the environment, compulsory purchase, highways, rating, housing, or local government finance and administration, as well as to pupils, bar students and university students with a significant interest in local government, planning and environmental law. Read more here.
