Clifford Sims has worked in the pensions and financial services sectors since 1987 and has been practising as a lawyer since 1994. He is a partner in our Pensions practice based in our London office. He is recognised as “an expert in investment and financial services in relation to occupational pensions” and "extremely well organised, very commercial and the leading lawyer for local government treasury pension matters" in Chambers UK. The Legal 500 UK said of Clifford that he is “more commercial than the average pensions lawyer”. Clifford also deals with all aspects of non-contentious pensions in advising trustees, employers, local authorities and providers of pension products.

Clifford is a frequent speaker at conferences and seminars; he has spoken at each of the NAPF's conferences for the last three years, the NAPF's Regulation Rendezvous in 2010 and 2011 and at a series of CIPFA Pensions Network seminars on procurement for local government pension schemes in 2010 and 2011.

Clifford is listed in the 2012 edition of Chambers and Partners’ Chambers UK as a leading individual for pensions.

Publications

• Buying Time: a CIPFA Pensions Panel Guide to procuring efficiency in public sector pensions administration, Chartered Institute of Public Finance Accountants, 2010
• Pension Fund Investment, Tolley's Pensions Law, 2010
• Equalisation could go off-kilter, Pensions Management, 2010

Representative Experience

• Advising the trustee of the Alliance UniChem Group UK Pension Scheme on the transfer of its defined benefit liabilities to Pension Insurance Corporation.
• Project management of benefit changes and restructurings (including closures to future accrual) for numerous employer and trustee clients, including schemes sponsored by Allianz Insurance, Compass Group plc, State Street Bank, Halliburton Inc and Vodafone Group plc.
• Coordinating complex multi-national advice on contingent asset security arrangements for the Vodafone Group Pension Scheme.
• Acting for local government pension schemes such as the West Midlands Pension Fund, Lothian Pension Fund and Suffolk County Council on numerous investment, procurement and benefit issues.
• Advising the Royal Bank of Scotland on hedging arrangements for local government pension schemes.
• Project management of liability driven investment programmes for clients such as the Vodafone Group Pension Scheme, the Anglian Water Group Pension Scheme and Landrover.
• Advising the Compass Group Pension Plan trustees on the re-negotiation of Government Actuary Department passports and the merger of Compass sponsored schemes

Clifford is an Associate of the Chartered Insurance Institute and a member of the Association of Pension Lawyers. He chairs the investment committee of the Society of Pension Consultants and is the immediate past chairman of the Association of Pension Lawyers' investment committee.