Important announcement

We are deeply saddened to report the loss of our dear friend and colleague, Lesley Attu. Our thoughts go out to all of Lesley’s family and friends, in particular, to her daughter, Rose.

It would be hard to overstate the importance of Lesley’s contribution, not just to the success and growth of ARAG, since she joined to manage our product development team more than a decade ago, but to the entire legal expenses insurance sector and beyond, over a career that spanned almost forty years.

During that time, she was responsible for designing the policies that have protected tens of millions of people and millions of businesses from the potential cost of exercising their legal rights.

Lesley was a tireless advocate of access to justice for all, who had the technical understanding and abilities to translate that motivation into valuable but highly affordable policies, which have provided enormous benefit to those who would otherwise have been left without recourse.

Her unparalleled expertise, meticulous research and ability to articulate them both led to her being asked to contribute to numerous industry, regulatory and governmental bodies. The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Legal Education; the FCA’s thematic review of add-on products; the Law Society’s Handbook on Litigation Funding and the cross-industry LEI working group which she chaired, were just some of the bodies and initiatives that benefited from her unique insight.

But it is as a friend and colleague that Lesley will be missed most, both here at ARAG and among the many of our business partners, suppliers and industry bodies with whom she worked. Always generous with her time, she was an incomparable mentor to many colleagues, throughout her career. Lesley was rarely without a smile, even in recent weeks when her illness made working increasingly difficult for her.

It is a mark of her indomitable nature that, despite the cancer, Lesley continued to work conscientiously and with characteristic good humour, until just a few weeks ago. While her contribution is irreplaceable, there is no doubt that Lesley’s spirit and motivation will continue in the work that we all do to increase access to justice for all in society.

We are very sad to have lost her, but fortunate and privileged to have had Lesley as our colleague and our friend.