Interview: Milestone for law firm’s managing partner

“I was never particularly interested in becoming a lawyer,” muses Christopher Butterworth, who is now marking 50 years at Harrogate law firm Raworths.

Looking back to where it all began, Mr Butterworth, the third generation of his family to have headed the law firm which has been a part of Harrogate life for nearly 130 years, says: “I felt the weight of history on my shoulders when I joined the firm, rather half-heartedly at the time, in 1966.”

His salary was £1.10.0d per week (£1.50) when he started as an articled clerk, aged 19. Back then, he was expected to cover a large range of legal and non-legal roles, which in his case included, at one time or another, receptionist, handyman, working in the local magistrate’s court, being the firm’s cashier and re-organising the archiving in the basement.

“My great-grandfather had been the police inspector in the town in the 1880s so you could say that the law ran in my family! My grandfather had joined Raworths only three years after the firm was founded by Edwin Raworth, but I was never particularly interested in becoming a lawyer. However, in those days sons followed their fathers into the family business.”

Although he had not looked forward to a long-term career in law, Mr Butterworth made a remarkable success of it, becoming a partner in 1972 and then managing partner in the 1990s.

Due to his interests in science, technology and engineering, he was a pioneer of the use of IT in the legal profession, even speaking at the International Word Processing Exhibition at Wembley in 1982, and one of the first word processors used by Raworths is exhibited at the Science Museum.

Mr Butterworth’s work ranged from personal injury and family law through to criminal, employment, commercial litigation and commercial work. He set up one of the first computerised debt collection services in the country and worked as an advocate in courts from the local magistrates’ court to the High Court.

Over 20 years ago he was also a pioneer of the use of mediation in the UK and built up a practice in this specialism. His mediation work has taken him as far afield as San Francisco, where he mediated a $65million IT dispute, and one of his more complex cases involved chairing a dialogue over fishing rights between the States of Jersey and Guernsey.

He is widely regarded as one of the most experienced mediators in the UK, and continues to mediate all over the UK, particularly in high stress inheritance, trust and rural dispute cases.

“The legal profession has fundamentally changed since my early years at Raworths,” he says. “When I started there were only 22,000 qualified solicitors in England and Wales compared to 134,000 now; a six-fold increase.

“However, even then, Raworths was very forward-thinking by having a female partner, Anne Taylor, at a time when only 2% of solicitors were women – now female solicitors aged under 40 are in the majority.”

Mr Butterworth, his father and grandfather are all past presidents of the Christopher Butterworth RaworthsHarrogate and District Law Society, in which Raworths has always played an active part; three of the last five presidents have been Raworths lawyers.

Three years ago he handed over the reins at Raworths and the firm is now run by a board of management led by family lawyer Zoe Robinson.

However, historic ties are as strong as ever and this enabled him to invite the BBC newsreader Sophie Raworth, who is the great-granddaughter of Edwin Raworth, the founder of the firm, to be a keynote speaker at the launch of the Raworths Harrogate Literature Festival four years ago.

Ms Robinson says: “Christopher’s influence on the direction the firm has taken over the years cannot be underestimated. Most recently, his navigation of the firm through the recession brought us to a stronger position now that the economy is recovering. From a personal point of view, I know that many members of staff regard Christopher as the ultimate oracle on matters as diverse as the history of the firm to how the latest IT systems work.

“He extends a helping hand to new starters, making them welcome whilst enabling those of us who have worked here over many years to use him as a sounding board and source of wise advice. He is held in high esteem by staff, clients and the many people with whom he has worked over 50 years in the law. We congratulate him on his extraordinary achievement.”

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