Using Contracts to Get to Net Zero – TCLP – S5E19

00:03 Robert Hanna:

Welcome to the Legally Speaking Podcast. I’m your host Rob Hanna. This week I’m delighted to be joined by Becky Annison. Becky is the Director of Engagement at The Chancery Lane Project. Becky got her MBA in legal practice and trained as a solicitor at the firm Bird & Bird. She then spent 14 years working as a commercial contract solicitor, and then as a senior editor at the Practical Law before moving to her current role. So a very, very warm welcome, Becky,

00:32 Becky Annison:

Thank you so much for having me on. Rob, it’s really great to be here.

00:35 Robert Hanna:

It’s an absolute pleasure to have you on the Legally Speaking Podcast. And before we dive into all your amazing achievements and projects to date, we do have a customary icebreaker question here on the Legally Speaking Podcast, on a scale of one to 1010 being very real, what would you rate the hit TV series Suits in terms of its reality?

00:55 Becky Annison:

Do you know I’m going to be really real with you. I’ve never seen Suits.

01:01 Robert Hanna:

That is absolutely fine, because quite a few of our guests haven’t seen Suits. So based on that, when you say 10. 10 there we go. Yeah, most people go zero and give the legal response saying well, I haven’t seen it. So there’s no way I could give comments. It has to be zero. But I like the optimism and 10. So we’ll stick with that. And we’ll move swiftly on. So to begin with, Becky, would you mind telling us a bit about your background and journey?

01:25 Becky Annison:

Yeah, sure. So I knew from quite a young age actually, that I wanted to be a solicitor which sounds quite dull, I should have probably thought to myself, I want to be a rock star. But no, there was, there was 12 year old Becky thinking, I want to be a solicitor. That sounds brilliant. And so then that’s what I work towards. And I trained as you know, at Bird & Bird because at the time, I thought I wanted to be an intellectual property lawyer. But it turns out through spending time doing your doing with different seats, that what really got me going was commercial law, and very quickly moved from private practice into in house. And I just think that suited me better in a lot of different ways. But I just I just loved being embedded inside my client. Just being able to just talk to people at the watercooler really understand the business in in a real kind of depth. Instead of having to kind of spread myself across lots of different businesses, I really enjoyed being a part of the business itself, and really helping in its journey. Because the great thing about being an in-house lawyer, obviously I’m a convert. So great thing about being an in-house lawyer is really the variety of what hits your desk. And that sense of you really don’t know what’s going to be coming to you the next day. And so while I was an in house lawyer, and I did a lot of commercial contract work, but those commercial contracts spanned everything from nuclear clean up work all the way through to cleaning contracts, the emptying wastepaper bins or building solar farms, or all sorts of things. And that kind of variety. It was wonderful. But there was a really another strand actually to why I loved in house so much Listen, become the In-house Promo Podcast. But the other reason I really loved being in-house was because the people that I was often giving advice to, I felt like I was really helping, it wasn’t a sophisticated user coming to a sophisticated law firm. It was often a contract manager who was really worried about something that was going on on their contract, and they would phone me up. And I felt like I was really helping somebody, not only to do their day job, but to take that burden of worry off them. And I found that really satisfying. Yeah, a long time found it really satisfying. Sadly, I was doing it for Carillion PLC, and that company is no more. Which is why I ended up leaving the world of in-house and went into Practical Law where I just had a fantastic couple of years, again, really trying to focus on what is going to stop people being anxious in their day job. So when I was at Practical Law, I was in the in-house practice area team and I did a lot of work on helping lawyers prepare for Brexit, helping lawyers navigate recessions, later pandemics, and also helping lawyers think about how to make their businesses more resilient for climate change, which is then became a real specialist interest for me, which is how I ended up at The Chancery Lane Project, which were again, my feel like my day to day job is taking something that people are anxious about, and helping to relieve that anxiety for them.

04:38 Robert Hanna:

Yeah, absolutely. And I guess you know, you are now the director, as you say, of The Chancery Lane project, you know, a nonprofit organization. Could you just tell us a little bit more about what you do specifically and what it does overall?

04:51 Becky Annison:

Yeah, I’d love to so I’m the Director of Engagement. And what we do generally, is our kind of our, the heart of what we do is persuading people to use contracts to tackle climate change. Because regulation is amazing for leveling the playing field. But it’s really slow. It’s achingly slow. But the great thing about contracts is you could change those in the next 20 minutes, if you wanted to, you could change your standard form precedent in the next 20 minutes with a good clause. But getting a good clause, starting from standing still, basically, drafting in a vacuum is really hard. So what we do, and what we have done is that we’ve pulled together interested parties into workshops, and these have been everyone from expert lawyers to industry experts, who are totally not lawyers at all. We’ve got everybody in a room and said, okay, if you were going to use your finance expertise, or your employment expertise, or your real estate knowledge, to write a contract clause to help make things better in terms of climate change, what would that look like? What would that do? How do you use all the knowledge you have about finance, instead of making a profit, to help the climate, and really, it’s the idea that we use contracts every single day to enshrine profit margins, or deliver value or set up service specifications or good specifications? Why not add climate considerations to that list, carbon reduction targets and all of that sort of thing. And so what I do is that I do a lot of going out and talking, and a lot of talking, so many people listening to this might have heard me talking and probably already sick of it. And I go out, and I talk to people, and I kind of say, well, here is an idea that you might not have thought of, I see that you or your company has signed up to a really ambitious climate target, had you thought about using contracts to help you meet that? Here is how you could do it. Oh, and by the way, we’ve got 104 clauses and a toolkit to help you do that, and loads of workshops, and it’s all free. I’m gonna say that one more time, actually. We’ve got 104 clauses, workshops, and it’s all free. That is not the number three, that is the free is in F R E E, freebie. 

07:08 Robert Hanna:

Okay, folks, so make sure you’re listening into that. And so you do so much work as the Director of Engagement, Becky, it has to be said and you know, it’s wonderful the work you’re doing, what does a typical day look like for you?

07:27 Becky Annison:

Oh, my life, it’s, it’s very varied. So it’s a lot more meetings than I had ever thought it would be in my job, my previous job was sitting in a dark room with a large pile of contracts and reviewing them. And now, I spend most of my time going and talking to people. And those meetings vary. Sometimes I’m telling people about The Chancery Lane Project, because they have heard about us, but they want to know more about what we do. Sometimes I’m doing webinars or panels. And sometimes it’s more targeted. Sometimes I’ll be having a conversation where somebody will say to me, you know, what, we’re really interested in using these clauses, but we’ve come across some barriers. What can we do about that? And I’ll say, well, we’ve got these case studies, here’s some people who already did it, and how they got over those barriers. So really sort of see myself as a, an advocate for doing this in a different way. And that means that I also spend quite a lot of time sort of researching what’s going on so that we can draw all these really interesting threads together. So here’s a really great example. The other day, somebody asked me a question about our clauses, I went away and had a little look over our clauses. So I can email them back and say, I think these are the ones you want to look at. And when I did that, I reread Eric’s clause. I must have read it ages ago, but I reread it. And I suddenly realized what a clever clause it was like, obviously, I do get paid to say that, but it is a clever clause. And I’m going to explain why. So Eric’s clause is an employment clause that you could put in your employment contracts, so that if somebody wanted to take a sabbatical for climate change, to go off and do volunteer work for climate change, and they could do that, but it goes beyond that, and it says, or if you wanted to put somebody on gardening leave, you could stipulate as part of that gardening leave, that they have to spend X days a week working for a climate change charity. So isn’t that amazing? Because gardening leave accompanies paying for it anyway, you can either have that person sitting at home twiddling their thumbs for six months, a year. Or you could say, you can sit and twiddle your thumbs for three days a week, but for two days a week, we want you to volunteer with this climate change charity. And in doing so, you would get a whole load of extra skills and experience and knowledge which is now becoming really important that you can take into your next job, but it’s not knowledge which is going to undermine your previous company. It’s only going to lift everybody up. So sometimes my job is really just just thinking and drawing these connections out. And then once I’ve done that thinking going out and saying to people, hey, you’ve used gardening leaving your organization? Had you thought about pegging it into volunteering for climate organizations?

10:06 Robert Hanna:

I love that idea. And I think it’s super, super powerful and makes so much sense. And you touched on there about The Chancery Lane Project, how it does assist lawyers and industry experts to create these clauses. Why do you think is important for both lawyers, industry experts to be educated about drafting those clauses?

10:26 Becky Annison:

I think there’s a lot of different reasons. And it’s a great question. But I think the primary reason is that this is where the risk is now setting. Climate change is such a massive area of risk. We are very familiar with using contracts to manage our risk. And I think that for anybody who’s sitting there thinking, climate change doesn’t apply to me. And I know that there’s been some recent guidance on this from the Law Society saying, you know, we are all climate lawyers now, really, in a way, because there is no area of life that climate change does not touch on. So there’s no area of law and legal practice that climate change does not touch on. And so part of what we’re doing, when we are doing these drafting workshops, and running our seminars, and our webinars, is helping people to upskill into something. And this is something I wanted to talk to your listeners about in particular, and, and you know what I’m going to say, but which is that there are very few climate experts right now, there are very few climate employment experts or climate finance experts, there is never been such an exciting time to be a young lawyer, I think, because you can carve out a amazing amount of expertise in a very short period of time, because everybody’s starting from scratch right now. You know, the partners are starting from scratch when it comes to climate risk and climate knowledge and climate contracting. So you can get in at the ground floor, or in a very new practice area, which is only going to get bigger, sadly, because climate risk and climate problems are only going to get worse. And governments are only going to hopefully increase what they’re doing to fix it. But that means more legislation, that means a whole new practice area of climate risk is here. And now is your opportunity to get in at the ground floor. 

12:11 Robert Hanna:

Yeah, and you know, we always want to make sure we’re educating our listeners on you know, career opportunities, and where you might be able to go and you’re absolutely right, you know, climate changes is here to stay. It’s a recession proof practice area. And it’s, you know, you could be doing it for good. And I think that’s really important to to highlight that. So thank you and, and talking about specific purposes, you know, these clauses, they aim to really tackle climate change. Why do you think combining clauses and climate change for contracts is significant?

12:40 Becky Annison:

I think it really comes down to the fact that contracts, these amazingly powerful tools, aren’t they. So instead of waiting for legislation, as I’ve said, we can use contracts. And we can do that really fast. So the first thing is contracts are a really fast way of making climate change of tackling climate change. But the second thing is that they are very specific and very bespoke. So anybody who’s done any contractual work will know that when you put something in the contract, people pour over it, it will either be reviewed by lawyers or operations experts, or ever, somebody is going to look at this. So at the moment, we have a situation where climate is really complicated. People are trying to put plans in place, but it’s really hard to put a plan in place because it’s so big. A one way of eating that elephant piece by piece, toe by toe is by saying if you put an obligation in a contract, that somebody will be on the hook for damages, if they breach it, suddenly that obligation is going to be reviewed and priced and double checked by a whole team of experts, who now have a piece of the puzzle on how to fix climate change. If you put a carbon reduction target in your contract and say you have to pay a penalty if you miss it. And that penalty is going to be spent by us on offsets to the tune of the amount you missed the carbon reduction by, you are going to work out how to make sure you don’t miss it. And there we are, suddenly a piece of the puzzle is solved in a way that it wasn’t before. And that is something that contracts do in the background automatically. It’s something we’re really familiar with. I mentioned earlier on the idea of service specifications and good specifications. You know, a carbon specification was just what’s one more three page schedule in a contract which is already 10 binders long.

14:29 Robert Hanna:

Very true, very true. Time for a quick break from the show. Are you a legal aid practitioner in England and Wales specializing in civil or criminal legal aid matters? If you are this message is for you. As a legal aid solicitor, you don’t have time to waste on legal aid case management software that doesn’t work to your needs. That’s why Clio has developed a quicker, more accurate and affordable solution to legal aid solicitors in England and Wales. It could save you hours in your month, particularly when it comes to end of month invoicing, and claims to the legal aid agency. To see how it all works, visit clio dot com forward slash UK forward slash Legal Aid. That’s Clio c l i o dot com forward slash UK forward slash legal aid. Now back to the show. The Chancery Lane Project focuses on climate and net zero clauses in contracts. So what is net zero, Becky? Oh, wow. Well, the

15:34 Becky Annison:

Best thing about net zero is there isn’t a single definition. And I’m hesitant to give you a definition, because then somebody will pop up, this is a legal podcast, some probably 20 lawyers. That’s very different. Instead, I’m going to slightly allied your question and say the reason we have used net zero is not because we think it’s necessarily the best metric. And that means that your carbon emissions are balanced out, so that your net by the carbon you’re taking out of the environment, so you’re sort of neutral, as it were, you’ve balanced those scales. It’s not that we think that’s the best metric. But what it is, is a metric, which is commonly understood and people are familiar with, and it is something that is achievable for businesses. And when so many businesses have signed up to Race to Zero as they did over COP 26 1/3 of FTSE 100 companies signed up to Race to Zero, it is an easy starting point that people understand. And what we say at The Chancery Lane Project is that some of our clauses are light green, they are low ambition, they are not going to take loads of carbon out. But they are a starting point, that’s not going to cost you anything to dip your toe in the water. And now we expect you to move up the ladder up to the closest, the dark greens that are aligned with Paris or go beyond Paris, that are aligned with net zero or go beyond net zero, and we are going to hold your hand every step of the way up that ladder to help you get to net zero and beyond.

17:14 Robert Hanna:

Brilliant. And sticking with net zero, then you also have a net zero toolkit designed to align contractual drafting with net zero, can you explain what that toolkit is?

17:25 Becky Annison:

I can I can’t there’s a lot in there. So the net zero toolkit really came out of COP 26, where we could see that so many people were signing up to the Race to Zero. And we wanted to give them a really clear way to assess their current contracting. So we have a dashboard that covers seven different areas. I’m going to try and remember them now. And I don’t have them with me, we’ll see how well I do. But they cover things like rate of warm up, the temperature that you’re currently online for. So if you look at all of your carbon related activities now, are you are you going to be pushing up the tempo? If everyone did what you did, are you going to be hitting four degrees in 2030? Or are you going to be hitting 1.5 degrees in 2050? Then we will look at the pace. So that is what’s your timescale? Are you planning on doing it in 10 years, 20 years, you do it by 2050 or sooner? You know, that sort of thing. The dashboard also covers elements such as just transition and explains what that is, it shows you how you can put that into your contracting, asks you if you are considering it in your contracting. Governance. So have you got metrics? How are you reviewing them? How are you tracking how well you’re doing about hitting your climate goals? You know, what are your climate goals? Have you kind of filtered those down for your organization? One of my favorite things that’s in there is a section on lobbying, which feels like it’s a little bit left field. But really, if you have signed up to the Race to Zero, and you are pouring money into organizations that are lobbying against the Paris Agreement and against putting the Paris agreement into legislation, then we know how are you managing that? You probably it’s probably not deliberate. But reviewing the lobbying that you are doing through all the trade associations that you signed up to is a simple thing that you could do, to see where you are on that journey. And again, it shows you and if you’re not doing that, well, then you’re probably missing a trick. And you need to think about it. So it’s a lot of different areas to help a lawyer sit down and review drafting that already exists to say, is there a way that we could continue to move up that ladder? But I actually think the best thing in the toolkit is a 10 minute video, a 10 minute video that explains what net zero is much better than I just did.

19:53 Robert Hanna:

No, I think you did a phenomenal job of that. I think it’s not straightforward. You did a sterling job, but I would encourage people also to check out that video just to also digest video and audio content. How about that?

20:07 Becky Annison:

That’s brilliant. I think this video is so good because only 10 minutes, play it to your board, play at the start of a supplier kickoff meeting so that everybody in the room before you start the business of the day, they all have the same understanding of net zero as you.

20:22 Robert Hanna:

Yeah, I think that’s a very valid point. And, you know, let’s stick with the the core toolkit again, if I can get my words out, to address this climate change specifically, do you believe this will initiate further discussions on climate change?

20:37 Becky Annison:

I think it has already initiated further discussions on climate change, which obviously, I feel very good about. Because it has really broken down the things that people need to talk about into really easy yes or no questions. And I think that really is really helpful. Actually, there’s a lot of confusion about climate change. And what I mean is this, if you can look at a clause in a contract and say, okay, this clause will take out X amount of carbon, because it’s a carbon reduction clause. So we’ve got our baseline, the clause says that our baseline has got to be reduced in a year’s time by X percent. So if this clause goes in, and if it’s complied with, we know that X percent carbon will come out brilliant. And your supplier comes back to you and says, that’s going to cost you I don’t know, a green premium of an extra 20,000 pounds. Well, then there you are, how do you make that decision, but you have a very clear decision to make now you know, how much carbon is going to come out? Because it’s in the clause?. You know, how that’s been priced? Are you going to pay for it? Who’s going to pay for it? And it just, it just suddenly takes off this, oh, we don’t really know how to do it and puts it into these really, really painful, but necessary clear questions.

21:54 Robert Hanna:

Yeah, no, and you’re absolutely right. And, you know, I think it’s important that, you know, this is all leading to accountability and change, which I think is paramount. So, you know, are there any practicalities which make drafting clauses into contracts specifically difficult? What solutions can be offered to tackle this problem?

22:12 Becky Annison:

Sure. I think the biggest problem actually with getting climate change clauses in is buying, you know, who who has set who has the say, over whether a contract gets changed. And, and let’s be real, and let’s be honest, some of our clauses will increase the negotiation time, some of our clauses will attract a green premium, you know, so that, and these are going to be barriers, if you want a contract where you want a huge amount of value for money, and you’re not prepared to pay any more, and you need it signed yesterday, and you don’t want to spend another week negotiating the green clause. You know, that’s a big barrier. So I think we need to take that step back the way that we get these clauses into contracts. Firstly, we make it easy by showing people the clauses of their by showing people what can be done, I think, getting over that hurdle of not being able to see what the solution could be. That’s why we are here is to say, here is an option, here is an idea, here’s the thing you could do. But the next step is then buying. It is getting people to understand why these should and could, could go in. And that might mean getting all of your supply chain in a room, educating them about climate change, educating them about your organization’s goals for climate change, and talking with them about how they’re going to partner with you to achieve that. It might be talking to your main board of directors who say actually, this is probably a bigger risk for our business than we realized because of X Y, Z, maybe you’re worried about getting sued. Maybe you’re worried about having Extinction Rebellion, blocking your offices off for five days, you know, maybe you’re worried or your reputation damage, or stranded assets, but kind of saying, actually, there’s a problem here that us as lawyers, we can help you fix. And one way we can do that is through contracts. And I think that having that conversation is essential.

24:11 Robert Hanna:

Yeah. And yeah, again, I just love how you’re articulating this because it’s just it’s just pulling into line what what I see is completely necessary and going to probably basically improve and make a huge difference to the world that we live in. So with regards to your website, then your website states you have 1300 legal professionals collaborating and I believe 285 participating organizations, which is a heck of a lot, what types of professionals and organizations are utilizing toolkits?

24:41 Becky Annison:

So a lot of law firms have looked at it and reviewed it and some of them and I am going to name check TLT Law, we have got a case study on them have put some of our clauses into their standard form precedence. So that’s one way, is people putting them in their standard form prices and so they just get rolled out as standard. But we also have had a huge, huge amount of engagement from corporates, which has just been really satisfying. And I think that that’s quite natural actually, because probably what has happened is a CSR committee somewhere has set a target, and then they’ve told an in-house lawyer oh, by the way, we need to achieve that target. And so we provide those in-house lawyers a really quick fix an easy set of tools that they can immediately start to, to, to put into their work, the day to day work to help them fix that problem that they have been handed by somebody else. And I think that’s really helpful, the other constituency of people who have been really engaged with us and really amazing procurement professionals, non-lawyers, but people who deal with contracts on a daily basis, and are really very much at the sharp end of negotiating with suppliers about getting contracts and clauses into those contracts. And they have been absolutely amazing. I’m really engaged as well.

26:03 Robert Hanna:

Yeah. And it’s interesting you mentioned procurement, because before I launched my legal recruitment business, KC Partners, you know, I did a lot of recruitment in the procurement space. And yeah, I did a lot of work with them and still have a lot of friends and they do have an eagle eye and they are very good negotiators. That’s for, that’s for sure. And sticking with with firms, then Nigel Brooks, senior equity partner at Clyde & Co, shall I say, has said “working with TCLP has been invaluable and expanding me and my colleagues practices to encompass the practical considerations of climate change”. What a ringing endorsement, that is. How would you like future firms to benefit from working with TCLP?

26:41 Robert Hanna:

Oh, that’s a great question. And also thank you to Nigel Brooks, Clyde & Co, who have been absolutely amazing, supportive organization. As have many other law firms, I can’t list them all. But they are all listed on our website, if you wanted to go and look. How can we help? Well, I’m going to say to you the thing that I’ve said to lots of law firms and partners. This is an area where corporates are desperate for help. This is a piece of chargeable work, not the things that we do, but the area of climate risk management. And whether that’s through contracts, whether that’s through internal policies, and risk assessment procedures, or whatever. There is an absolutely massive problem here that lawyers could be making money out of as a practice area. And I’m going to say in this way, because, you know, obviously, I am a tree hugger. But I appreciate that not everybody in the world is a tree hugger. But so this is a potential practice area. And what I would really like to see is law, law firms looking at what we’ve done, and having that spark off in their own mind. Oh, hang on a minute. Where could we take this? We can use these clauses as the starting points to suddenly build up a climate risk business. And there are accountancy firms out there, there are management firms and consultancy firms. They have climate risk businesses, and I would like to see law firms really having climate risk businesses as well. And some are, I know that Clyde & Co and Nigel Brooks have an amazing climate risk business. I know that Minters in Australia have an amazing climate risk business and others do as well. But this is a fantastic opportunity for lawyers, as you say it’s a recession proof practice area that’s on the rise.

28:30 Robert Hanna:

There we go. That’s kind of a ring to it, actually. Recession free practice area on the rise. Yeah, but we’re keeping temperatures low. And so in terms of, I guess, people wanting to be, you know, get involved with this, I’m sure it will attract a lot of interest, because we do want to highlight the importance of this, this particular episode, how can people or companies interested, get involved with the project?

28:54 Becky Annison:

There’s a few different ways. And the first and the easiest is please sign up to our newsletter. When we have new events. When new clauses come out, because we publish new clauses or we update clauses, then it all comes out via our newsletter. And that’s the best place to stay in contact with us. Past that, my plea would be, please look at our clauses and please use them. We have 104. If you think there is nothing in those 104 clauses that would work for your organization and tell me because that’s a gap that we need to fill. But we have heads of terms clauses, non-disclosure agreement closes, recitals to go in the front of any contract, due diligence questionnaires, we have a very wide range. There is going to be something there that that fits with your organization. And if every person on this, who listens to this podcast, put one clause that removed carbon into one contract, that is an amazing start of something big, isn’t it? That would be huge.

29:57 Robert Hanna:

Absolutely. And it’s just taking that first step. I think you know, we’ll just really kickstart things. So yes, absolutely. And not only Becky, are you a wonderful guest, and we’re loving having you on the Legally Speaking Podcast, you’re also a fabulous co-host of the legal podcast called The Hearing for Thomson Reuters. So, what’s the podcast about what message does the podcast convey to your listeners?

30:18 Becky Annison:

Oh, well, The Hearing is a podcast from Thomson Reuters, as you say, where we look at a lot of different issues, often relevant social issues, but we look at them through a legal lens. So that’s what’s going on. So I’ve recently published an interview, or Thomson Reuters has just published an interview with Mark van Ball, who is the man behind follow this, if you remember earlier, in 2021, May 2021, Chevron had a board defeat, with a shareholder resolution from Mark’s organization, which was backed by BlackRock around the Paris Agreement, it was a huge. It happened in that that wild week where the Shell decision came out, and the Australia court decision came out. And Exxon, Chevron both had board defeats, while he was the non-profit organization behind that board defeat for Chevron. And we go into the nuts and bolts of how it was done. Which for a legal geek, like me, was absolutely perfect.

31:21 Robert Hanna:

And I think it’s fascinating. And I think it’s great that you you do that and bring that content to people. And yeah, I think you did a wonderful job. So I would encourage people to definitely check out The Hearing podcast. So finally, Becky, after the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP 26. And as climate change continues to be more and more prevalent, which it most definitely should be, what do you believe is the future for lawyers and the climate?

31:48 Becky Annison:

I think the future for lawyers, is sort of the same as everybody else, and that we’re all living on this planet. And really, and I don’t, I don’t I try not to spend too much time on this. But things are pretty bad. In terms of climate change, they are bad, but but we have a window of opportunity. Now take, take us, as lawyers come closer lawyers, come closer. We are trained to look at incredibly complex things, incredibly complex situations, and tease out solutions and make those solutions stick, make them stick. Because you’re in breach of contract if you don’t, or you know, all the many other reasons. But to make. We are there to make things really happen. Now, when you consider all of the skills that lawyers have, and the crisis we’re facing in the climate and how complicated it is. Just imagine what could be achieved. If a group of incredibly intelligent people who are very good at sifting information, complex information coming up solutions were mobilized to fix it. Because that’s us. That’s you. That’s me.

32:57 Robert Hanna:

Wow, what a powerful message. And I guess just to wrap up, then, if our listeners would like to learn more about The Chancery Lane Project or your podcast, The Hearing, I know you mentioned the newsletter, you know, is that still the best way for people to contact you specifically or feel free to shout out any other social media or web links will also share them with this episode for you too.

33:19 Becky Annison:

So we’re on Twitter and we’re on LinkedIn if you want to look for The Chancery Lane Project over there. Or you can email me at Becky dot Annison Chancery Lane project.org if you have a question, and I would absolutely love to help you with that.

33:35 Robert Hanna:

Yes, absolutely. And thank you so much, Becky. It’s been a real pleasure having you on, you know, really important discussion today. And I hope we’ve we’ve highlighted the importance and what practical solutions and steps and accountability we can do to really pioneer the change. But we’d like to wish you lots of continued success with the project and your career but for all of us on the Legally Speaking Podcast for now, over and out. This week’s review comes Zara, powerful five stars, amazing to hear a podcast that shines a light on how varied the legal industry is. Hearing from a number of people with unique journeys consistently instills me confidence that my route is also taking me down the path of success. Incredible. Zara, thank you so so much for your kind words from all of us on the Legally Speaking Podcast. We appreciate you.