Henna Malik

Henna Malik is an Associate in Bird & Bird's public sector projects team within the firm's Commercial department, based in London. Her practice focuses on Government Contracts.

She supports clients in the public and private sectors on commercial transactions and relationships, specialising in providing pragmatic and strategic advice on a number of issues, including:

achieving successful procurement outcomes by assisting public authorities with designing and running complex procurement procedures; advising bidders on putting their best foot forward in a procurement procedure, including drafting clarification questions and, where necessary, whether there may be merit in challenging a public authority decision; collaboration activities including joint ventures between the public sector and between the public and private sectors; public sector commercialisation activities including setting up and running trading vehicles; advising on the formation of Teckal companies and group company reorganisation; implementing sustainability and social value initiatives; and complying with best value obligations and the fiduciary duty to achieve value for money.

She also regularly advises on interpreting legislation including vires (whether a public body has the power to carry out an activity), State aid and subsidy control assessments, risks associated with non-compliance of conditions of contracts including grant funding applications, and a variety of issues pertaining to public and administrative law, including potential judicial review grounds.

Her approach in advising clients is to first understand what the client is trying to achieve and then work with them to implement the solution.