PROFESSIONAL CAPABILITY
Meet Our Team
ACLS brings together experienced legal professionals whose backgrounds span litigation, court advocacy, criminal and fraud casework, immigration and international protection, private client work, compliance, and legal operations.
Our team is selected for more than technical knowledge. We place equal weight on professional judgement, procedural discipline, discretion and the ability to produce work of a standard suitable for demanding legal environments. This depth of experience enables ACLS to respond intelligently to instructions requiring specialist knowledge, additional capacity or careful handling under pressure.
Specialist capability. One accountable service.
Every instruction is accepted, scoped and managed through ACLS. We assess the nature of the work, its complexity, deadlines and the level of experience required before determining the appropriate allocation.
This structure enables law firms, chambers and other professional organisations to access targeted legal-support capability while retaining a clear chain of responsibility, controlled delivery, confidentiality and quality oversight.
The profiles below introduce a selected cross-section of the professionals within ACLS and the experience available through the firm. They do not represent the full breadth of capability available for instruction.
Ali A. Nour
Founder & Director
Executive Legal Operations · Immigration & International Protection · Litigation Support
Ali is the Founder and Director of Anglia & Charter Legal Services and leads the firm’s strategic development, procurement, instruction management and professional delivery framework. He established ACLS following several years working within legal practice, regulated immigration services and the wider justice system, with a particular understanding of how complex casework is received, structured, progressed and delivered under demanding procedural deadlines. His legal background is principally grounded in immigration, asylum, human rights and public-law casework. Ali previously served as Principal Immigration Adviser and Director of UK Immigration Gateway Ltd, within the regulatory framework now administered by the Immigration Advice Authority. In private practice, his work included asylum and human-rights appeals, complex protection claims, witness evidence, tribunal bundles, legal and country-of-origin research, First-tier Tribunal preparation and judicial-review support. His experience extends to vulnerable-client matters involving trafficking, family separation, medical evidence and urgent challenges to Home Office decision-making. Ali has also worked internationally in Ireland, supporting international-protection matters before Ireland’s International Protection Office. That work has included detailed client instructions, protection applications and submissions, country-of-origin research, preparation for IPO interviews, review of protection decisions and evidential material, and liaison with clients and other professionals involved in progressing protection claims. This cross-jurisdictional experience has given him practical exposure to both UK asylum practice and the Irish international-protection system. Alongside substantive casework, Ali has developed particular experience in legal operations and practice infrastructure: client onboarding, KYC and due diligence, internal compliance, file-management systems, legal technology, workflow design, document control and the preparation of operational policies and procedures. He previously served as a Police Constable with Greater Manchester Police, gaining frontline experience of evidence, safeguarding, risk, vulnerable persons and multi-agency liason.
Shabana Khan
consultant clerk & paralegal
Private Client · Wills & LPAs · Trusts & Estates · Legal Drafting · Compliance & Governance
Shabana is an experienced private-client and legal drafting professional with more than three years’ experience across regulated legal practice, including trusts and estates, trainee solicitor work and private-client support. Her background encompasses Wills, Lasting Powers of Attorney, estate administration, client meetings, legal documentation, file management and the handling of sensitive and confidential information within environments subject to professional and regulatory standards. Her principal strength lies in the preparation and management of private-client work where accuracy, clarity and professional judgement are essential. Shabana’s experience includes drafting Wills and LPAs, preparing documentation for trusts and estates matters, supporting estate administration, translating client instructions into clear legal documents and maintaining files capable of withstanding internal review and regulatory scrutiny. She has worked with matters requiring careful record-keeping, structured documentation and close attention to the legal and practical consequences of the instructions being given. Her experience extends beyond the preparation of individual documents. Shabana has developed a strong working understanding of compliance, governance, policy interpretation, audit readiness, confidential information management and procedural accuracy. She is accustomed to operating within professional frameworks where the quality of the underlying record matters as much as the final document, and where omissions, inconsistencies or weak file discipline can carry consequences long after the immediate task has been completed. Shabana holds a BA (Hons) in Law & Business and has completed the Legal Practice Course at De Montfort University. She is fluent in English, Punjabi and Urdu and brings particular interest in legal drafting, compliance, governance and professional standards. Within ACLS, Shabana is particularly suited to instructions involving private-client drafting, Wills and LPAs, trusts and estate administration, document preparation, compliance-focused review and work requiring disciplined file management, careful interpretation of instructions and a high degree of confidentiality.
Nigel Roberts
sENior consultant clerk & paralegal
Serious & Complex Fraud · Crown Court Case Preparation · Disclosure · Financial & Digital Evidence
Nigel is a highly experienced criminal justice and fraud casework professional with more than four decades’ experience across the Crown Prosecution Service, criminal defence practice and specialist consultancy. His work has encompassed serious and complex fraud, Crown Court preparation, disclosure and unused material, HMRC and VAT investigations, money laundering, proceeds-of-crime matters, complex financial evidence, briefing counsel and large-scale digital document review using Relativity. Nigel possesses wisdom acquired through sustained exposure to complex case preparation, evidential failure, disclosure issues and the practical demands of serious criminal litigation. He also brings substantial governance experience from professional rugby league, including salary-cap regulation, player registrations, contractual matters and regulatory administration. Within ACLS, he is particularly suited to complex criminal and fraud instructions requiring experienced evidential scrutiny, disciplined document analysis and the organisation of technically difficult case material. Away from the legal environment, Nigel is a keen supporter and student of rugby league in England and Australia.
Habab A. Nour
Chief of Research & Scholarship
The Anglia & Charter Society for Law, Justice & Scholarship
The Anglia & Charter Society for Law, Justice & Scholarship is spearheaded in its research and scholarly work by Habab Ali Nour, a PhD candidate and interdisciplinary researcher whose academic background spans gender and diversity, social research, language, culture and the study of institutions and their effects on the people who encounter them. Habab brings to legal research a perspective that extends beyond the text of a rule or judgment. Her work has involved examining how institutions, social environments and systems of authority are experienced in practice, particularly where questions of discrimination, inequality, identity and social bias arise. She has undertaken both qualitative and quantitative research, designed research instruments, collected and analysed data and presented findings within academic settings. Those methods are particularly valuable to legal and policy research concerned not simply with what a rule says, but with how it operates, whom it affects and whether its consequences reflect the principles it is intended to serve. Habab holds a Master’s degree in Gender and Diversity and a Bachelor’s degree in Language and Area Studies: Arabic and Islamic Studies, bringing together research into society, identity, culture, language and the structures through which power is exercised and understood. She has also undertaken academic research in Cairo examining social, political, historical and cultural dynamics, giving her direct experience of approaching questions comparatively and within their wider institutional and regional context. That breadth has particular relevance to the Society’s legal research. Many of the most important questions in law cannot be answered by doctrine alone. Questions of access to justice, equality, migration, public decision-making, human rights, institutional legitimacy, discrimination and law reform require an understanding of what happens when legal principle meets lived experience. Habab’s research background equips her to approach those questions critically: testing assumptions against evidence, locating legal problems within their social context and examining the distance that can exist between an institution’s stated purpose and its practical effect. Her experience in education and academic communication adds a further dimension to that work. She has designed structured programmes, developed teaching material and communicated complex subjects across differing levels of knowledge and cultural experience. Within the Society, that translates into an ability to work with contributors, interrogate developing ideas and help ensure that serious research remains intellectually rigorous without becoming inaccessible. As Chief of Research & Scholarship, Habab leads the development of the Society’s research agenda and the intellectual direction of its scholarly programme. Her remit includes identifying questions deserving sustained legal examination, developing research themes, working with contributors and publishing residents, supporting the progression of substantial research projects and helping shape a body of scholarship that connects legal principle with evidence, institutions and the society in which law ultimately has to operate.
Zahra Alidina
senior consultant clerk & paralegal
Civil Litigation · Court Advocacy · Dispute Resolution · Enforcement
Zahra is a civil litigation professional with substantial level of courtroom experience. She was called to the Bar of England and Wales by the Honourable Society of Gray’s Inn in March 2021 and has subsequently worked as a Court Advocate across a broad civil practice. Her professional record includes 1,398 court appearances, with experience across the County Courts, the Rolls Building, the King’s Bench Division and the High Court. Her caseload has encompassed insolvency, mortgage possession, landlord and tenant proceedings, interlocutory and procedural applications, personal injury, credit hire, company-law disputes, road traffic litigation, consumer credit, debt recovery and enforcement. Zahra’s earlier experience includes work as both a caseworker and paralegal, providing a foundation in file preparation and substantive legal support before the development of her advocacy practice. Within ACLS, Zahra brings a litigation-facing perspective particularly valuable where an instruction requires procedural precision, confident analysis of contested material and an understanding of how work product will ultimately function in a court environment.
Kalim Ullah
sENior consultant clerk & paralegal
Litigation · Commercial & Contract Law · Legal Research · Drafting
Kalim is an experienced litigation and commercial-law professional and a qualified Advocate in Pakistan, with a practice background encompassing civil, criminal, family and commercial proceedings. His experience includes appearing and pleading before the courts, preparing cases for litigation, conducting legal research and drafting pleadings, agreements, contracts and formal legal notices. He subsequently progressed to qualification as an Advocate of the High Court, bringing ACLS substantive courtroom experience alongside a strong grounding in case preparation and written advocacy. His practice is reinforced by postgraduate specialisation in International Commercial Law at the University of Sussex, where his work extended into international investment and commercial law. Kalim’s combination of advocacy experience, commercial understanding and disciplined legal analysis makes him particularly well placed for complex research, drafting, litigation support and document-intensive instructions requiring careful attention to both the law and the underlying case strategy.
Our team is defined by technical excellence, disciplined delivery and operational discretion. ACLS consultants integrate directly into the workflows of chambers, law firms and regulated legal practices, providing immediate specialist capacity for complex, high-value and time-sensitive instructions.
Consultant profiles describe individual experience and areas of work. Instructions are accepted, scoped and managed by Anglia & Charter Legal Services Ltd, with the availability and allocation of any particular consultant subject to the nature and scope of the instruction, demonstrated competence, capacity and ACLS acceptance.
The profiles presented on this website are selective and do not represent the full breadth of our consultant cohort. ACLS maintains access to additional professional capability across a range of practice areas, with consultants deployed according to the complexity, specialist requirements and particular demands of each instruction.