Commercial: including general commercial contract, sale of goods, fraud, misrepresentation and undue influence, insurance, banking and securities, bailment, carriage of goods, agency, hire purchase and consumer credit, restrictive covenants and breach of confidence, wrongful interference with goods, and restitution.

Chancery and Property: including partnership and shareholder disputes, directors duties, trusts, contracts for the sale of land, conveyancing, boundaries and disputes over title, rights of way and other easements, nuisance and negligence affecting land, trusts of land, mortgages, highways, and cases involving inclosure acts.

Professional Negligence: solicitors, surveyors, valuers, accountants, insurance brokers, architects, and engineers.

Conflict of Laws (Private International Law): including jurisdiction under European law and at common law, the enforcement of foreign judgments, and choice of law and the proper law of contracts.

ADR/Mediation: accredited mediator experienced in acting as a mediator and at representing parties at mediations.

Areas of Expertise

• Commercial Litigation
• Chancery & Property
• Professional Negligence
• Alternative Dispute Resolution
• Mediation

Reported Cases

• Smith -v- Muller [2008] EWCA Civ 1425
  (whether a fencing obligation under an inclosure award prevented the grant or acquisition by prescription of a right of way by the party required to fence - whether the grant or acquisition by prescription precluded by trust for public purposes imposed by inclosure award on the servient land)
• Bradford -v- James [2008] EWCA Civ 837, [2008] BLR 538
  (boundary dispute - existing planning consent - admissibility of extrinsic evidence including evidence of subsequent use of the land conveyed to construe the dividing Conveyance)
• Black Horse Ltd. v Langford [2007] EWHC 907 (QB), [2007] RTR 38
  (s. 56 Consumer Credit Act 1974 – whether supplier deemed agent for creditor when goods sold by supplier to intermediary credit-broker and then by credit-broker to creditor before forming the subject matter of a hire purchase agreement)
• Fretwell v Graves LTL 25/5/2005 (Leeds Ch.D, HHJ Langan Q.C.)
  (Land Registration Act 2002 – void transfer – further transfer to innocent third party – whether arguable case for rectification of the land register against third party – whether interim injunction should be granted restraining further dealings with the property pending trial)
• CPL Industrial Services Holdings Ltd. v R & L Freeman & Sons [2005] EWCA Civ 539
  (judgment entered in default of compliance with unless order in commercial litigation – merits of the defence – whether relief against sanctions should be granted and judgment set aside)
• Habton Farms v Nimmo [2003] EWCA Civ 68, [2004] Q.B. 1
  (agency – sale of goods – scope of agent’s authority - measure of damages for agent's breach of warranty of authority where goods had perished shortly after the sale)
• Galliford (UK) Ltd. v Markel Capital Ltd. [2003] EWHC 1216 (QB)
  (Third Parties (Rights Against Insurers) Act 1930 – Housing Grants Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 – whether insurer liable in respect of adjudication award against insolvent insured)
• Granville Oil v Davis Turner & Co. Ltd. [2003] EWCA Civ 570, [2003] 2 Lloyds Rep. 356
  (international trade – carriage of goods - whether freight forwarder contracted as principal or as agent – whether 9 month time-bar clause satisfied requirement of reasonableness under UCTA 1977)
• SSQ Europe SA v Johann & Backes OHG [2002] 1 Lloyds Rep 465
  (international trade - conflict of laws – Art. 17 of Brussels Convention - whether jurisdiction agreement effectively incorporated into contract of sale by seller's standard terms and conditions)
• Cook v Financial Insurance Co. Ltd. [1998] 1 WLR 1765 (House of Lords)
  (insurance – construction of exceptions clause in disability policy – whether insured had received advice treatment or counselling for condition which had not been correctly diagnosed prior to the inception of the policy)
• Pritchard v Cook LTL 4/6/1998 (CA)
  (sale of goods – whether a pre-contractual representation as to the technical specification of a rally car engine was a term of the contract of sale although not referred to in the contract documents)

• 'highly regarded as "the best advocate" with an "understated courtroom presence" and an ability to "approach difficult questions from all angles before finding the right direction of attack and dismantling the argument forensically."' Legal 500, 2011
• 6 scholarships and prizes by the Middle Temple, including a Queen Mother’s Scholarship and the 1st Ver Heyden de Lancey prize for being the highest placed Middle Temple student in the 1989 Bar Exams.
• '...is an effective chancery and commercial junior with a reputation for 'establishing the key issues very swiftly.' Legal 500: 2010
• 'gets to the heart of a case very quickly.' Legal 500: 2009
• 'incisive and clever' Legal 500: 2008

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• Call: 1989