Interview with Monidipa Fouzder
When Alice Cutler was crowned Miss GB in October, she became the first qualified lawyer to win the competition in its 80-year history. But to win in 2025 felt particularly poignant. It was in 2015 when the then 17-year-old entered the world of pageantry. It was also in 2015 that Alice lost her mother, who was killed in a car accident. Alice’s father died when she was nine.
Pageantry has given Alice a platform to advocate for a cause close to her heart – a legal right for employees to paid bereavement leave. While a Miss England finalist last year, Alice ran Instagram Live sessions, where she came across several horror stories. ‘Some people were forced to take unpaid leave to go to the funeral of a loved one. One person was fired. Some people were made to use their annual leave. As a solicitor, I put my legal hat on and started looking into it.’
Alice tells me seven in 10 employers have a bereavement policy, but policies vary. After competing in the Miss GB final last year, she launched her ‘Time to Grieve’ campaign.
Talking to me about her journey so far, Alice’s strength and determination are evident. Alice broke her spine in the car accident, which took years to recover from. But she managed to finish her A-levels, graduate in law at the University of Southampton and secure a training contract at Clifford Chance.
Alice moved to London to start a six-month LPC in January 2020. Two months later, the country went into lockdown. She spent the majority of her LPC and the first year of her training contract remotely in her bedroom working long hours.
Alice describes herself as a ‘property development nut’, always watching Channel 4’s Grand Designs. Her first part-time job was working in an estate agency on a Saturday morning when she was 15, writing emails and going on valuations for people’s houses. Alice didn’t do real estate until the fourth seat of her training contract. After qualifying, she moved back to Southampton and joined Foot Anstey, which had a development team acting for property developers.
Alice’s CV also includes stints in BCLP’s general real estate team and Lester Aldridge’s real estate development team. While she was at Lester Aldridge, she got a call from the land director at property development company Wyatt Homes.
Alice joined Wyatt Homes as assistant land manager in July. Alice may not be a practising solicitor, but her job requires her to draw on her legal skills. She identifies potential sites, speaks to landowners, looks at titles and negotiates deals. Before our interview, she had been looking at a combined development agreement and purchase contract. Following our interview, she was going on a site visit. Alice isn’t involved in drafting – external solicitors do that. But ‘when documents come in, I can have a look, do a sense check and see if it’s what I would expect’.
As reigning Miss GB, Alice will be participating in the New Year’s Day Parade, going on a charity trip to India and judging pageants. But on her bucket list? ‘I would love to get into parliament and talk about bereavement leave.’
No comments yet