The legal team at the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is discarding its traditional model of working in specific sector groups. Instead it will launch a restructuring team that will draw in lawyers from all of the other teams.
The launch comes after RBS ;announced ;the appointment of Abbey National chief financial officer Nathan Bostock, who will join RBS in June as deputy chief executive and head of restructuring and risk.
On the legal side, the global restructuring group will be led by in-house lawyer Mark Elliott, who will now report to legal head of UK corporates Lee Doyle.
An increase in restructuring work was the main motivation behind setting up the global restructuring team, although it is understood that the legal team also felt that a dedicated restructuring group was now required due to the higher level of risk the work carries.
In an unrelated decision, RBS is reviewing its in-house legal structure following the bank’s announcement that it would pull out of leveraged, structured real estate and project finance (The Lawyer, 9 March).
Deputy general counsel Chris Campbell is understood to be heading the internal review of the legal group.
One source familiar with RBS’s legal function said: “They’re restructuring their business units, so they need to restructure group legal too to reflect how the underlying business is changed.”
RBS ;declined ;to comment on the matter.
