Press Release
Milbank Lawyer Daisy East Receives UK Solicitors Pro Bono Group Paul Nicholls 2005 Award
Lawyer Honored for Her Outstanding Commitment to Age Concern Lewisham
London, May 18, 2005 - In recognition of her excellence in pro bono service, Daisy East, a senior associate in the London office of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP has won top award at the prestigious UK Solicitors Pro Bono Group Paul Nicholls 2005 Award for Outstanding Contribution to Pro Bono. At a ceremony held last week in London at the offices of DLA Piper, the award’s sponsors, Daisy and two other teams of lawyers were honored for their outstanding pro bono commitment in 2004 to community groups who had been identified by the Solicitors Pro Bono Group as being in need of assistance. The prestigious awards received over 30 nominations from community groups nationwide who have received pro bono advice from the legal profession around the UK.
Daisy, in Milbank’s Global Project Finance Group, was awarded First Prize for her efforts on behalf of Age Concern Lewisham, an organization that seeks to provide for the welfare of more than 5,000 older people living in the borough of Lewisham, South London. Through her dedicated efforts, Daisy not only helped to save Age Concern from imminent bankruptcy, but also helped to secure a rescue package which guaranteed the organisation’s short-term future.
Age Concern Lewisham’s Chief Officer Jacqueline Chew noted the critical impact Daisy’s work has had on the organization. “Due to Daisy’s hands-on approach, dedication and determination, the organization successfully secured sufficient grant funding to enable the charity to continue providing its invaluable services.”
Daisy’s award comprises a very significant sum of prize money for Age Concern which will be used to re-establish Age Concern’s home visiting befriending service. Through weekly visits from volunteers, this essential service actively seeks out the most vulnerable and isolated elders within the community, providing personal contact and ensuring their well-being. Daisy’s involvement with Age Concern continued even after the immediate crisis had passed; her time and expertise have given the organization options it did not previously have, as well as the credibility to raise additional funds which are required to cover the costs of this service for the entire year.
Commenting on the Award, Russell Jacobs, partner-in-charge of Milbank’s London office’s pro bono programme, stated, “We are extremely proud of Daisy’s achievement. She helps co ordinate the pro bono effort in the London Office and (as with her colleagues) she devotes a huge amount of her working day (and night!) to sometimes quite complex pro bono matters. This award is a credit to Daisy’s strength of character and a reinforcement of Milbank’s long-standing commitment to pro bono. While Milbank’s New York office was recently honored with the prestigious Legal Aid Society “Pro Bono Publico and Public Service Law Firm Award” in recognition of the pro bono efforts of the Firm and ten individual attorneys, this award puts the London Office’s pro bono commitment firmly on the map. Through the invaluable work of the Solicitors Pro Bono Group we are better able to match our resources in London with our institutional commitment to the pro bono needs of the community.”
About the Solicitors Pro Bono Group and DLA Piper’s Paul Nicholls Awards
Founded in 1997, the Solicitors Pro Bono Group (SPBG) is a small, independent charity whose objective is to enable and encourage lawyers throughout England and Wales to provide free legal help to individuals and community groups in need, primarily by providing practical support, advice and information; developing new pro bono initiatives; and facilitating partnerships between the legal profession and the not-for-profit sector. Most of the SPBG projects come under the “LawWorks for Community Groups” banner (www.probonogroup.org.uk) Sponsored by DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary, the Paul Nicholls Memorial Foundation Awards, now in their fourth year, were established by the firm in memory of the late Paul Nicholls, DLA Piper Manchester and London office managing partner and strong advocate of corporate social responsibility.
About Milbank:
Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP is a global law firm headquartered in New York, with offices in Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Palo Alto, London, Frankfurt, Munich, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore. Milbank is a recognized leader in mergers and acquisitions, capital markets and corporate finance, project finance, acquisition finance and other major fields of legal practice. Milbank has English, German and U.S. law capabilities, and provides a full range of services to many of the world’s leading financial, industrial and commercial enterprises, as well as governments, institutions and individuals.