No5 Barristers’ Chambers, one of the UK’s largest sets, has elected new heads of chambers. 

The set, which has more than 260 barristers including 40 silks in Birmingham, London and Bristol, has announced that planning barrister Peter Goatley KC and criminal barrister Michelle Heeley KC will lead the set as joint heads from January.

The duo has succeeded criminal and regulatory barrister Adrian Keeling KC and clinical negligence silk Jonathan Jones KC, following their five-year term of office.

During their tenure, the set relocated from its offices in Fountain Court in Birmingham, Britain’s second city and its home for more than 60 years, to new premises at 103 Colmore Row, following a seven-year search.

The set, founded in Birmingham more than 100 years ago, agreed to a 20-year lease in one of the city’s landmark buildings, close to many leading regional and national solicitors’ firms, having also relocated its London premises to Savoy Court in 2022.

It gained three new tenants in public law last December, as well as five London-based tenants in family law in July and recent individual arrivals in family, business law and crime. Three London criminal law silks also joined the set in July, two as door tenants, alongside a senior junior, while 12 pupils took tenancy in 2024. Two silks, Richard Hadley and Matthew Brook, were appointed as King’s Counsel in March.

Tony McDaid, the set’s long-term chief executive and director of clerking, paid tribute to the departing heads of chambers: “Chambers is immensely grateful to Adrian and Johnny, who have led by example and excelled throughout their tenure.”

McDaid said he looked forward to working with the new joint heads, noting both had served on the set’s management and executive committees. “It has always been clear that they both have the skills and calibre to be heads of No5, and their individual qualities complement each other,” he concluded.

Goatley was called to the Bar in 1992 and took silk in 2020. He specialises in planning and environmental law, mainly residential and commercial developments, in which he is highly regarded within the field and for which he enjoys a national practice at a time when the current Labour government has proposed extensive reforms as a part of its pro-growth agenda. 

Heeley has stepped up as co-head of chambers after concluding her term as leader of the Midland Circuit, one of the largest UK regional bar associations. She was elected to that role in 2021; her tenure spanned the end of the Covid-19 pandemic, disputes between the criminal Bar and the previous Tory government over legal aid, and ongoing backlogs in the criminal courts. Harpreet Sandhu KC of the same set succeeded her.

Heeley was called in 2001, took silk in 2017, and is regularly instructed to both prosecute and defend complex criminal trials ranging from murder to drug conspiracies and serious sexual offences.

Goatley and Heeley’s elevations coincide with the departure of Geoffrey Carr, the set’s head of clerking in London. Carr, the current chair of the Institute of Barristers Clerks, left No5 after eight and a half years and wrote on LinkedIn that he was open to new opportunities. Both he and the set were approached for comment on his departure.

The set has also appointed George Bennett as a practice director in London. Bennett joins from Outer Temple Chambers after 17 years of clerking in leading London sets, with McDaid commenting he would enhance the clerking team and business development for national and international work. Bennett’s arrivals follows Dan Woodbridge joining the set in February as senior practice manager to the business and property group in London.