We have developed innovative and engaging training, viewed by more than 14,000 health and social care professionals.

As experts in this field, we offer a wide range of bespoke training and resources, which have been made available to thousands of health and social care professionals.

Virtual mock inquest training sessions

For practicing clinicians and any health and care professionals who want a more holistic understanding of the inquest process. The course provides essential knowledge, tools and insights delivered by a range of legal experts.

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Health and Care Connect

A forum for operators, suppliers, investors and advisers in the independent health and care sector. Members of the forum can benefit from collaborating, networking and receiving regular sector updates via our quarterly newsletter.

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O Shaped

We were the first law firm to partner with O Shaped, the business providing practical guidance on how private practice and in-house teams can work together more collaboratively to strengthen client relationships. As part of the O Shaped community, we offer a free half-day session to in-house teams to share ideas around value creation, relationship building and understanding in-house client issues.

Shared Insights

Our monthly, one hour online forum which connects leaders and professionals from across the health and care sector to discuss sector challenges and share learnings, ideas and best practices.

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At Browne Jacobson, our dedicated corporate health lawyers offer bespoke and pragmatic advice with a commercial focus to protect and grow healthcare businesses, such as care homes.

We act for clients looking to buy, sell, incorporate, invest or reorganise their businesses, tailoring our service to their specific needs. We ensure a smooth and efficient client journey, providing support and guidance at each stage of the transaction.

Our specialist healthcare corporate team advises on:

• M&A.
• Private equity investments.
• Management buy-outs (MBOs).
• Reorganisations and restructuring, including operating company (OpCo)/property company (PropCo) splits.
• Company secretarial agreements.
• Joint ventures.
• Incorporations.
• Distressed transactions.

Whilst selling, buying or investing in a care home can seem a daunting task, Browne Jacobson’s practical solutions will allow you to approach the market with confidence.

The due diligence process is an extremely important part of the transaction. Depending on the findings, this may affect whether the sale progresses and may impact the value of what is being sold. Popular with prospective sellers, we provide a “legal health check” service which maximises value and helps to identify potential issues allowing you to remedy them before going to market.

The commercial services we offer include:

• Drafting Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) compliant terms and conditions and carrying out CMA audits.
• Data protection policies and documentation, including compliance audits.
• Advising on the process for implementing fee increases.
• Advice on orphan residents.
• Support with commercial disputes including with commissioners and relatives.
• Drafting bespoke agreements e.g. special care packages.

Our banking and finance team capitalises on the firm’s unique independent and public healthcare offering. Our ability to provide sector-focused transactional, property and regulatory advice means that we secure repeat work from funder and borrower clients in this sector.

35% of the transactions our banking and finance team act on are in the health and care sector, and a large percentage of these are private equity transactions. During these transactions, our clients have access to our expert lawyers across the firm who provide commercially focused advice to help protect lenders and borrowers in the sector, considering the landscape of changing policy and regulation.

Recent experience

Advised HSBC on a facility agreement to a UK holding company to fund the acquisition of a Norwegian care home provider.

Advised Aurora Group in connection with a refinancing of its corporate debt.

Advising Virgin Money on its development finance facility to Cornerstone Healthcare Group to develop a £10m 74-bed specialised care centre in Wincanton.

Advised HSBC and Natwest on syndicated facilities to the Dovehaven Care Group. Advising Virgin Money on its first property lending transaction with Nine Points Property Limited – a developer and landlord in the sector who has developed a strong reputation, for sourcing, refurbishing and then leasing top quality properties to a range of great operators.

Our specialist criminal, compliance and regulatory team advises clients at every stage of their interactions with key regulators, including the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the police and regulators of health and safety, fire safety and food safety.

CQC registration

We provide a comprehensive CQC registration advice service, including preliminary advice on the regulatory implications of corporate structures, preparation of registration documentation and advice on necessary policies and procedures. We represent providers in appeals against registration refusals.

Compliance advice

Once operational, we provide proactive regulatory compliance advice, through written updates, face-to-face or online training, reviews of policies and procedures and ad hoc queries. We work with a trusted selection of clinical advisers where broader advice is required. We have successfully judicially reviewed CQC guidance that has been detrimental to our clients.

Challenging the CQC

We can also help when things don’t go well. We’re routinely instructed to contest CQC draft inspection reports and Warning Notices as well as registration conditions, suspensions and cancellations.

We regularly secure significant changes to reports and the reversal of enforcement decisions, either directly from the CQC or through appeals.

Critical incidents and criminal investigations

Our critical incident response service gives clients the immediate benefit of our experience in what can be unfamiliar and challenging circumstances. Where required, we assist providers with internal inquiries and assist with media and public relations management.

We assist care homes facing police, CQC, fire service and local authority criminal investigations – responding to information requests, preparing responses under caution and often avoiding prosecutions as a result.

Where prosecutions do arise, our in-house advocates can provide representation before the Magistrates’ and Crown Courts.

Recent experience

We advised and assisted one of the largest UK care home groups concerning CQC registration requirements for internal restructuring. We provided a comprehensive registration service including coordination of registration applications in Scotland and Isle of Man.

We are representing a national care home company in police and CQC investigations, a fire authority prosecution, and inquests and civil claims including an internal investigation.

We successfully challenged a refusal of registration application and resisted a Warning Notice and urgent enforcement action against an independent provider.

We successfully appealed the urgent imposition of registration conditions by the CQC and challenged a draft inspection report on behalf of a national care provider.

We have built sector-leading expertise in providing real estate advice to clients involved in the later living sector. This includes care operators, investors, developers and banks advising on acquisitions, sales, lending and new developments.

Our real estate lawyers are widely recognised for their knowledge and understanding of the sector.

We can project manage all aspects of sales and acquisitions, developments and plot sales, drawing on the knowledge and skills of our multidisciplinary later living team. Whether it is property, planning, environmental, construction, health and safety, regulatory, or corporate support that is needed, we’ve got it covered.

We advise on:

• Acquisitions and sales, whether of shares, individual assets or portfolios.
• Site set up and plot sales.
• All aspects of negotiating, drafting and finalising property related contracts that may be required across the spectrum of the later living sector.
• Property related risk mitigation.
• Intragroup transfers.
• Setting up propco/opco structures.
• Reporting on key risks of existing arrangements and options for restructuring.
• Due diligence on borrowing and lending, acting for the borrower, investor or bank.
• Redevelopments and new developments, including construction documentation.
• Resolving property, construction, environmental and planning issues and disputes.
• Advising on planning and environmental enforcement actions by the relevant authorities.

Recent experience

We supported United Health in a restructuring of the group working alongside our corporate colleagues. We carried out intragroup transfers which enabled the client to split up the different aspects of its business and take each to market.

We acted for Towerview Healthcare Group in transactions to support their portfolio of specialist nursing homes providing care for people with complex and mental health care needs.

Our experience of working with clients in health and social care across both the independent and public sectors gives us a unique insight into the employment and HR issues you face.

We have a team of lawyers who specialise in employment issues within the health and social care sectors.

Our support to clients covers all aspects of employment law. Whether that is providing TUPE and due diligence support in acquisitions and service provision changes or supporting clients through complex employee relations issues. We also appreciate that many of our clients do not have access to specialist in- house HR support, so we can act as the missing sounding board or critical friend when HR issues arise.

Recent experience

Employment issues arising from the closure of a care home.

Creation of a suite of HR policies and contracts for an independent health and social care client.

Internal due diligence exercise on a care home provider’s HR documentation and ER cases to get it ready for potential sale.

Advising care home providers on the management of resident safety concerns raised by employees.

Representing clients in all types of employment tribunal proceedings.

Providing practical training to care home managers on all aspects of employee management, including sickness absence and disability discrimination, performance management, disciplinary proceedings.

Supporting clients to respond to concerns raised by employees about toxic leadership cultures, bullying, harassment and discrimination.

Transfers of services and protection of employment rights under TUPE.

Developing workforce sharing models to allow clients across the Integrated Care System (ICS) to make best use of the existing health and social care workforce.

We have a dedicated team of mental health, healthcare advisory and inquest specialists with unrivalled knowledge and expertise in the sector.

Inquests

We have one of the largest healthcare inquest teams in the country, dealing with more than 450 inquests annually. We often act on high-profile cases with extensive press attention and a high risk of reputation damage. Many are jury inquests.

Inquests can be time consuming and stressful experiences for staff and clients, all of which is at the forefront of our minds when we support you through the process.

Mental capacity and deprivation of liberty

We have a dedicated team of Court of Protection specialists acting for a broad range of clients nationally with an unrivalled knowledge and expertise of the sector. We’re passionate about what we do and are known for being at the forefront of society’s biggest issues, working to make a difference across business and society.