Legal Elite

The establishment of new firms, some prominent partner moves and a plentiful flow of new work have characterised the past year in Perth's legal fraternity.

Most people know of Pacman as an early computer game, but for takeover lawyers the term has been applied to the unusual circumstances surrounding the battle between Alinta and The Australian Gas Light Company.

Big corporate collapses such as Sons of Gwalia, EG Green Group, Henry Walker Eltin and most recently Westpoint Corporation have provided plenty of work for insolvency lawyers, but a much smaller deal has been hailed as the best restructuring of 2005.

Law firms Clayton Utz and Blakiston & Crabb have been at the forefront of one of the major trends in the mining industry in the past two years: the move to Canada by miners looking to raise large amounts of money.

When Western Power formally split into four separate businesses on April 1, it marked the end of a long-established reform plan by the state government.

A booming economy, militant construction unions and the biggest regulatory change in a century have combined to make workplace relations one of the busiest practice areas for Perth's law firms.

The rapid expansion of Western Australia's iron ore industry and the emergence of several aspiring producers have prompted the negotiation of an increasing number of joint venture agreements.