Law in genes for oldest family firm
Jan 17 2008 by Karen Dent, The Journal
BRITAIN’S oldest family law firm is marking almost 300 years in business by moving to bigger premises in Newcastle.When Jasper Gibson founded Gibson and Co in Hexham, he could never have imagined that a will he drafted in 1715 would have pride of place in the law firm’s new headquarters in 2008.
Toby Gibson, 38, a commercial litigation lawyer, and his wife Jane, 40, are the latest family members to join the firm. Toby – Jasper Gibson’s great,great,great,great,great,great,great,great-grandson – is the 10th generation of the family to practise law with Gibson and Co.
He said: “It wasn’t particularly overt, but there was an expressed hope that this was what I’d do. I am very pleased to be part of such a long-running family tradition that I’m that not fussed if it ends with me.”
Toby, 38, spent 10 years working in London and Hong Kong before returning to the North-East with his wife and three children under seven. He admits there is plenty of time for them to get into the family business but he says he won’t be putting any pressure on them to follow in his footsteps.
Toby’s father Tony, 70, and uncle, Derwent, 62, both still work for the firm, which retains an office in Hexham as well as Newcastle. Tony Gibson set up the Newcastle headquarters in 1965 and the move to new premises in the West Road is the first time the city premises have shifted.
Although the firm moved because it had outgrown its old Newcastle office, it is part of a declining breed – the small, family-run lawyers that are facing increasing competition from the large high street companies.
Toby said: “The big change has probably been in the last 10 to 15 years. Legal work has become commoditised, so I think that the traditional high street practices are under threat because there are many big firms that are using their economies of scale. You do get what you pay for.”
It’s unlikely the firm will ever have to deal with the type of cases Jasper Gibson undertook. As Catholics, the family supported the ill-fated 1715 Jacobite Rebellion against George I. Jasper’s brother died in Newgate Gaol, where he was imprisoned alongside the local landowner, the Earl of Derwentwater. Jasper stood on the scaffold as the Earl’s “man of letters” and took down his last words before he was executed. The family still retain a rather grisly memento of the occasion – the bloodstained cuff of the Earl’s shirt.
But Gibson and Co is not stuck in the past. The new offices are “modern and edgy” and Toby has added his speciality of commercial litigation – resolving inter-company disputes – to the firm’s traditional key activity of conveyancing, which is coupled with a strong private client base.
He puts the business’s longevity down to a number of factors, not least a family love of the law. He said: “ I’d like to think it’s because people in my family enjoyed being lawyers and were good at it. I don’t think it’s necessary for lawyers to be entrepreneurs, but I think you do have to have an entrepreneurial spirit.”
Toby also believes Gibson and Co has lasted the course because the firm’s people sit down and talk to each other. “It’s about communication because for a family business to run successfully, as with any business, you’ve got to communicate well between the management and the staff.
“It’s a particular challenge for a family business because there’s a lot of time spent together, but you don’t want to be spending it all talking business. I think like most marriages, businesses fail when communication breaks down.”
