Honest email sent; Firm taken to woodshed

Rough week for the UK firm Eversheds.  Yesterday, the firm announced it fourth (!) round of layoffs redundancies. RollOnFriday asks, “If one redundancy programme is unfortunate and two look like carelessness, then how can four be explained away as anything other than complete incompetence?” (Ah, Oscar Wilde.)  

Today, a UK Government-commissioned report on the collapse of car manufacturer MG Rover was released.  Eversheds had been Rover’s counsel when the carmaker was acquired by the Phoenix Consortium.  The report rebuked Eversheds for failing to do full due diligence in connection with the acquisition. Piling on the embarrassment, the report quoted an email sent by Eversheds partner Mike Seabrook: “Congratulations and thanks to everyone for a great job in completing Phoenix within an impossible timetable - even if we don’t know what we have bought or what any of the agreements say!!”

                                            -posted by brian