Michael Webster is a lawyer based in London, England, who was admitted to the bar in England in 1967 after studying law at the University of Bristol and the College of Law. He has worked as a partner at Rowe & Maw, a London law firm established in 1895.
Background
Michael Webster's formative legal training took place in England. He read law at the University of Bristol, an institution that traces its origins to University College, Bristol, which opened on 10 October 1876 in rented premises in the city.
The college was founded through local initiative in a period when provincial England was expanding access to higher education. It was open to men and women on the same basis, except in medicine, and it received a royal charter as the University of Bristol in 1909.
Education
Webster read law at the University of Bristol, where he received a Bachelor of Laws with honours in 1963. The university's origins lie in University College, Bristol, whose history is traced to efforts by John Percival, headmaster of Clifton College, to establish such an institution in the West of England. The college admitted men and women on the same basis, except in medicine, and became the University of Bristol by royal charter in 1909.
His professional qualification was recorded at the College of Law in 1967, the year he was admitted to the bar in England. The College of Law had been created in 1962 when the Law Society's school of law in London merged with Gibson and Weldon, a tutorial firm founded in 1876 that prepared candidates for solicitors' and barristers' examinations. The Law Society's school had itself been founded in 1903, and the College of Law operated as a private teaching institution with branches in London and Guildford.
Career
Webster's professional career has been based in London. He is documented as a partner at Rowe & Maw, a firm established in London in 1895. On 1 February 2002, Rowe & Maw merged with the American firm Mayer, Brown & Platt to form Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw, and the combined practice later shortened its name to Mayer Brown in 2007.
In English law firms, a partner shares in the ownership and management of the practice. In a London firm of this kind, the role places the partner within the firm's leadership while the practice serves commercial and private clients through its solicitors.
