Solicitor calls time on career

Godfrey Pickles (new Senior Partner) with Paul Vincent, who is retiring from Wrigley Claydon Solicitors

ONE of Oldham’s longest serving and most respected solicitors has retired.

Paul Vincent, who was senior partner at Wrigley Claydon for 10 years, has stood down as a partner at the Union Street office but will continue as a consultant with Wrigley Claydon — generally regarded as Oldham’s longest-established business, tracing its roots to 1795.

A Londoner raised in Wembley, Mr Vincent (65), who lives in Waterhead, came north to study law at the former College of Commerce, now part of Manchester Metropolitan University.

On receiving his degree he was articled to a Manchester law firm firm, which is now part of the giant Pannone legal business, before joining Wrigley Claydon in 1973. Within three years he was made junior partner.

Paul has specialised in company and commercial law and, at 28, hit the national headlines when he acted for the parents of Louise Brown, the world’s first test-tube baby, and Dr Patrick Steptoe.

Dr Steptoe worked with Professor Robert Edwards, who wasn’t a client, at the Royal Oldham Hospital.

Professor Edwards, who has just been awarded a Nobel Prize for services to science and medicine, asked Mr Vincent to compose a foreword to his book.

Mr Vincent: “They were exciting times. I remember having to speak to a government minister and telling him he couldn’t publish a film of the birth — and I was only 28!”

He has been succeeded by Godfrey Pickles, who joined Wrigley Claydon in 1975 and is based at their Todmorden office, which he has run since it first opened more than 30 years ago.

Mr Vincent will be kept busy in his retirement as president of Oldham Rotary Club, of which he has been a member for 20 years, and at Saddleworth Golf Club, working on his 21 handicap. He is also a trustee of Groundwork Oldham and Rochdale.