Vail Williams’ Russell Miller has welcomed members of the industry body for fixed charge and property receivers to their flagship annual conference.
As the new chair of NARA, Russell opened the organisation’s first face-to-face event, held at Haberdashers’ Hall in the City of London, since the beginning of the pandemic.
He told the conference: “NARA is essential in my view to ensuring that the highest possible standards are maintained by its members and it is my role alongside the Executive team and Council to keep challenging our conduct, promote the organisation and advance the reach and influence of what we do in the interests of all stakeholders.”
Russell, a Partner and LLP Member at property consultancy Vail Williams, who operates across the UK for receivership work, added: “The NARA Conference remains the flagship event of the year for our industry and it was of course unfortunate that we were unable to host it last year in the same way due to the pandemic.”
He paid tribute to the work of John Hughes, NARA’s chair for the past two years, and the “ongoing leadership and dedication” from chief executive Julian Healey and Teresa Horden, who was largely responsible for organising the conference.
Philip Collis of TLT, a new NARA Council member, was also publicly thanked for his training sessions to members, as was Paul Joseph from Strettons who recently became a fully-fledged registered property receiver and contributed to the latest Fundamentals Course.
Congratulations was also extended to four new fellows of NARA, who successfully qualified as registered property receivers – Lucy Garner-Currie, Benjamin Holyhead, Toby O’Sullivan and Sholom Cohen.
Russell works out of Vail Williams’ offices in Bournemouth, Southampton and Portsmouth.
Afterwards, Russell said: “I am delighted to be the chair of NARA for the coming year as we at Vail Williams continue to provide LPA/fixed charge receivership expertise across the country during these interesting times.”
The conference, entitled Fight on all fronts – plotting a path through the pandemonium, is normally held in spring; it was held virtually last year due to Covid-19 restrictions.
NARA members are highly qualified professionals who deliver focused consultancy services before, during and after receivership.
They are drawn from the property, legal, banking and insolvency sectors.
A fixed charge receiver – also known as an LPA receiver, in reference to the Law of Property Act 1925 – is appointed by a lender to recover money loaned to a borrower, usually by way of a mortgage, and which is secured on either real property or other fixed assets.
The appointment is made by the lender when the borrower is in default of the loan terms and the process under a fixed charge receiver can be a quicker, simpler and more cost-effective way to secure recovery of the loan than the alternative borrower insolvency routes.
Guest speakers at the conference, held yesterday (October 21), were counter-terrorism consultant Major Chris Hunter, renowned economist Andrew Sentance CBE, social housing expert Dr Len Gibbs and risk analysis expert Gerald Ashley.