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Portrait ofGillian MacLellan

Gillian MacLellan

Partner

CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang LLP
1 West Regent Street
Glasgow
G2 1AP
United Kingdom
Languages English

Gillian MacLellan is a partner in our UK Employment Team working with clients in various sectors across the UK, advising on both contentious employment matters and transactional work; the common thread in both areas is her ability and determination to get a great result for her client. Gillian works regularly with clients in the financial services and energy sectors where her industry experience ensures her advice is well rounded and fit for purpose. Gillian frequently advises clients with a global footprint meaning she has strong experience of the challenges for international employers, both from a compliance and a culture perspective. An area of keen interest for Gillian is supporting on diversity & inclusion and in this space, by way of example, she has worked with employers on global diversity reviews, advised on the roll out of D&I reporting projects and supported employers on complex internal harassment complaints as well as defending discrimination claims before the Employment Tribunal.

Gillian is a regular speaker at conferences and an author for LexisNexis and XpertHR. She also writes monthly for The Herald on issues of interest to employers.

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"Provides a fantastic service and her response times are great" and "she is very solution driven and knows how to make the law work for us".

Chambers

"down to earth and easy to work with" and "hardworking, focused and non-pretentious."

Legal 500

Commended for her "professional and pragmatic counsel".

Legal 500

Relevant experience

  • The Scottish public sector on the complex employment issues arising out of its GBP 100m+ wide area network contract with Capita and supporting through competitive bid dialogue.
  • A major energy client on major change project involving the closure of a UK site and transfer of activities to different jurisdictions outside of the UK.
  • Clients on Employment Tribunals across the UK, including a multiparty action arising out of a large scale redundancy exercise, whistleblowing claims, discrimination actions and cases involving alleged breach of financial services regulations.
  • A major financial institution on the TUPE and employment related issues arising out of its GBP 700m datacentre/infrastructure outsourcing to IBM.
  • 9 month secondment to Employee Relations team of HBOS (now LTSB) during period of major organisational change for the client.
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Education

  • 2000 - Dip LP, Glasgow Graduate School of Law, Glasgow
  • 1999 - LLB (Hons), University of Glasgow, Glasgow
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Feed

29/09/2023
Regulators consult on measures to improve diversity and inclusion and promote...
After much talk and the promise of action, on 25 September 2023, the Prudential Regulation Authority (“PRA”) and Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) (together the “Reg­u­lat­ors”) each published...
22/06/2023
Workforce reporting
Reporting on workforce data is one way of measuring the social aspect of ESG. Gender pay gap reporting is probably the most popular method but there are other ways that an organisation can publish workforce data to enhance their ESG credentials.  Apart from gender pay and some aspects of corporate governance, workforce reporting is a largely unregulated area of the law. Employers currently have a choice about what information they publish. We believe that will change in time. The direction of travel is towards greater transparency and more data, as the EU has shown in adopting the Pay Transparency Directive. Although this Directive will not apply to the UK when it is implemented in three years’ time, we envisage it will have an impact in the EU with multinationals who operate across the EU and the UK.
19/01/2023
Governing for good
Environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) considerations are increasingly important for business success. A sharpened focus is being placed on ESG matters by stakeholders, including potential corporate...
16/12/2022
The Law and the Little Things: Microaggressions in the workplace
Microaggressions in the workplace Most organisations today recognise the importance of equity, diversity and inclusion within their workplaces, in particular, how to build an inclusive culture.  However, organisations need to go beyond warm words to deliver on commitments in prac­tice. Mi­cro­ag­gres­sions are subtle acts of discrimination; unfortunately commonplace behaviours that many write off as too trivial to mention - the “little things” that just happen. Though “little” in name, these occurrences can become large by nature, and businesses must be aware of the deep and often devastating impact of ignoring them.
15/12/2022
FCA - Understanding approaches to D&I in financial services
The FCA conducted its review via 12 regulated firms – 8 with large gender pay gaps and 4 with relatively small pay gaps. The average pay gap for the financial services market is 26.6%, which is far...
14/12/2022
Current Issues in Contentious Financial Regulation - Part 4
Apologies, but the wrong registration link was used in the previous invite. If you would like to register for this event, please use the correct link below. Sometimes things don’t go to plan and when...
14/12/2022
FCA - Understanding approaches to D&I in financial services
Ensuring the D&I reality lives up to the rhetoric The FCA has published the findings from its review of how financial services firms are approaching diversity and inclusion (D&I) strategies. The review...
30/11/2022
Executive Remuneration
09/11/2022
Heads-up on harassment changes
The Government has given support to a Private Member’s bill which will change the law on sexual harassment. The Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Bill (the Bill) introduces a duty on...
23/09/2022
ESG: Pay Gap Reporting – a tangible way to show progress under the S 
In the second of our ESG series looking at employment law and ESG, we explore the role of pay gap reporting as a way of demonstrating a company’s social credentials. One of the central challenges for...
06/09/2022
CMS Expert Guide on discrimination in the workplace
Measures to ensure that citizens are treated equally and respectfully, regardless of gender, ethnicity, age, sexuality, beliefs and other criteria have witnessed constant evolution over the past 75 years...
Comparable
05/09/2022
CMS Expert Guide on discrimination in the workplace
Any employer working in multiple jurisdictions needs to be aware of their different duties in relation to workplace discrimination. In particular, they must understand their obligations in terms of introducing...