Beachcroft has expanded its public sector team with the hire of Eversheds partner Eve Gregory.

Gregory joins the national firm today (1 March) as a partner in the Leeds office after serving nine years as a partner at Eversheds, where she was responsible for the UK top 10 firm's health estates group in the north.

Gregory, who has significant public sector real estate experience, will work with both the public sector and property teams across Beachcroft's Leeds, Manchester and Newcastle offices.

Beachcroft national real estate head Virginia Clegg said: "In line with our focus on the health and public sectors and with our recent appointments to major procurement panels such as Prone and the NHS' North West Collaborative Commercial Agency and the Yorkshire and Humber Commercial Procurement Collaborative, it is important that we continue to grow our health and non-health public sector teams, particularly in real estate."

She added: "At a time when the public sector is under increasing pressure to identify and implement major efficiency savings, and public bodies seek to maximise revenue from their real estate, Eve's skills will be invaluable to this growth area."

Other Eversheds partners to have moved to Beachcroft include Newcastle clinical negligence head David Weatherburn, who joined the UK top 25 firm in November 2008 alongside partners Neil Row and Paul Taylor. It later emerged that a total of 51 staff had joined Beachcroft, including 29 lawyers.