Our People David Brown
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David Brown, 1951- April 2011 On behalf of all his colleagues at Davies and Partners, Partner, Mark James pays tribute to Partner David Brown who died on 4 April 20ll having sadly lost his battle with cancer which he fought with great courage and dignity. David leaves his wife Penny and son James.“David was a superb planning lawyer, a good friend and very much admired colleague and he will be sorely missed by all who knew him. David’s legal career began when he took his articles with Devon County Council where he became a solicitor after qualifying in July 1977. He then joined Berkshire County Council where he met his future wife Penny. His devotion and specialism to planning law began when he moved to Surrey County Council when he became its planning lawyer. His planning expertise developed further when he was engaged as a planning solicitor by DJ Freeman in the City of London at the end of 1987.
David went on to become a planning and environmental lawyer for Nicholson, Graham and Jones before he became self-employed providing freelance expertise to a number of companies including Cheltenham Borough Council in its planning department.
David joined Davies and Partners in 2002 becoming head of planning and a partner in 2004. During his esteemed career David made a considerable contribution to planning law and he was always endeavouring to broaden his and others’ knowledge in this specialist area. This included writing and editing of a number of books including Tolley's Environmental Management and chapters on dangerous substances in Health and Safety Handbooks'.
Not many people can claim to have received a reference from a legal adversary, but such was the admiration for David that one of his listed referees for his appointment by Nirex was a QC, who provided David with a glowing reference having suffered a rare defeat at David’s hands.
David was known by his colleagues and clients as a lawyer who would always look for a solution to planning problems by pushing at the boundaries of law. I recall with great admiration, David’s ingenious drafting to avoid positive obligations in unilateral obligations relating to a major residential development and his arguments with the Secretary of State that joint and several obligations could not be imposed on landowners by virtue of the terms of Section 106.
A QC who worked closely with David during a long running planning inquiry and associated high court litigation commented that David’s “patience, skill and imagination in dealing with the protracted legal issues concerning the s.106 obligation in particular were quite remarkable”.
David’s clients always knew he would go the extra mile for them. He comfortably beat my record for an unbroken meeting of 37 hours and he even kept working on the same project from his hospital bed, following a serious break of his ankle.
David had a real love of life and a highly positive outlook which would seek the bright side of any situation. He loved language and was a supporter of traditional wording. David was an enthusiast for the King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. He studied standard Latin and Ancient Greek at St Thomas Aquinas Grammar School in Birmingham. After school, he learned and continued to improve his Greek which he liked to use on trips to Greece.
David shared Penny’s love for opera and chamber music but he enjoyed a wide range of music. For example, David discovered and enjoyed the Norwegian folk Jazz group “Farmers Market”. Not being main stream the band proved quite difficult to follow and track down but with perseverance he managed to do so, ably assisted by his son James. Last year he even succeeded in meeting up with the band in the bar at the Queens Hotel in Cheltenham. This was a classic example of how when David got a passion for something, he was totally committed. Another pastime of David’s was enjoying good food and fine wine. He was an adventurous, experimental cook and had an excellent nose for wine. He liked nothing better than to visit a French vineyard and buy directly from the grower before adjourning to a local restaurant. On occasions David’s pastimes neatly combined as when he sailed the Channel, crewing for friends, and ended up in a French port sipping fine wine. As well as his Channel exploits, David enjoyed dinghy sailing and skiing. His other hobbies included playing bridge, the theatre, and growing vegetables in his garden.
As a friend and colleague David will best be remembered by me and all his colleagues at Davies and Partners as a superb planning lawyer, a very intelligent and articulate man, with a love of language. He was very generous of spirit and with his time.
David is perhaps best encapsulated by the words of one of his major clients who described him quite simply as, “a real gentleman.”
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