I worked closely with Steve in public law in Landmark since 2016 and his room was along the corridor from me.    He was a treasured colleague and a friend.

Steve was a good guy – indeed the best.  He was someone who became a lawyer for other people’s benefit, and spent his professional life trying to make the law deliver solutions for the most vulnerable in our society.  His main areas of practice – social care and immigration –showed where he chose to make a difference.  These areas involved state powers which interacted with people at the most difficult times of their lives, and where people desperately needed the state to act properly.  Whether he was acting for a person seeking a better immigration status, a person seeking social welfare support or a local authority trying to do its best in an impossible situation, Steve was active in these areas because they were cases where the law was important to those in need, and where getting it right really made a difference. 

He was also a great colleague and always there to support others.  He took time to write extensively so his knowledge was available to others and did numerous cases without payment.  He was a quiet, intensely intellectual and cultivated man with huge interests outside the law.  To say he will be greatly missed is a massive understatement.  

The last exchange I had with Steve before his heart attack – and after his decision to move to Doughty Street – was to discuss when we could get a weekend’s walking together in his beloved Lake District.  That will not now happen but, in a funny way, he will always be with me whenever I walk those fells in the future.

My thoughts and prayers go to Shirley and all of his family.