Chambers is pleased to announce that Robert Palmer QC has been appointed a Deputy High Court Judge. His appointment will take effect on 1st October 2021.

The appointment followed an open competition by the Judicial Appointments Commission. Robert will hear cases in the Queen’s Bench Division. The role of Deputy High Court Judge is reserved for those who have the experience and expertise to deal with very complex cases which would otherwise be undertaken by High Court Judges.

Robert will sit in the High Court for around 30 days a year, and will also continue to practise full time from Chambers.

The shortlists for Chambers UK Bar Awards 2021 have been announced and Monckton Chambers is once again in the running for the Set award for Competition. In addition, Monckton has two members in the final three for Competition Silk of the Year and two barristers in the shortlist of three for Junior of the Year for the same category:

Competition Set of the Year
Competition Silk of the Year – Jon Turner QC
Competition Silk of the Year – Paul Harris QC
Competition Junior of the Year – Ben Lask
Competition Junior of the Year – Julianne Kerr Morrison

The winners will be announced at a ceremony on Thursday 18 November at Old Billingsgate, London.

The awards recognise a Chambers’ pre-eminence in the UK. They also reflect achievements over the past 12 months including outstanding work, impressive strategic growth and excellence in client service. They honour the work of Chambers across the country based on the research for the most recent edition of Chambers UK Bar.

The full shortlist can be found on the Chambers and Partners website.

Azeem Suterwalla has been promoted to the Attorney General A panel, joining Ben Lask who was also successful in retaining his place in the panel which deals with the most complex government cases. Michael Armitage has been promoted to the “B” panel in this round of appointments, which commence from September for five years.

The Attorney General maintains four advisory panels of junior counsel to undertake civil and EU work for all government departments. There are three London panels (an A panel for senior juniors, a B panel for middle juniors, a C panel for junior juniors) and a regional panel. In addition, there are three Public International Law Panels.

In total, these most recent appointments mean that a total of 18 members of Monckton Chambers are on the following AG’s panels:

• A Panel: Raymond Hill, Alan Bates, Ben Lask, Andrew Macnab, Peter Mantle, Brendan McGurk,  Ewan West, Azeem Suterwalla.
• B Panel: Fiona Banks, Julianne Kerr Morrison, Michael Armitage.
• C Panel: Conor McCarthy, Jack Williams, Imogen Proud, James Bourke, Khatija Hafesji.
• Public International Law A Panel: Thomas Sebastian
• Public International Law C Panel: Nikolaus Grubeck

The applications are no longer being accepted, the deadline was 20 September 2021. All successful applicants will be contacted via email by 18th October.

Applications are now open for the mentoring scheme for underrepresented groups at the Bar run by Monckton Chambers with 9 other sets.

The purpose of the scheme is to support and encourage individuals from groups which are underrepresented at the Bar of England and Wales (and in particular the commercial bar) to pursue careers as barristers. Those underrepresented groups include women; people from minority ethnic backgrounds; people with disabilities; LGBT+ people; people who spent time in care; and people from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds.

In the scheme’s first year, over 400 applications were received and 150 mentees were matched with mentors. In addition to Monckton, the following Chambers are taking part this year: Blackstone, Brick Court, Essex Court, Fountain Court, Gatehouse, Keating, 7 King’s Bench Walk, One Essex Court and 3 Verulam Buildings.

The scheme will run between October 2021 and May 2022. It is open to all undergraduates and graduates from groups that are underrepresented at the Bar of England and Wales (and in particular the commercial bar) and who do not yet have a pupillage offer.

Successful applicants to join the scheme will be allocated a mentor, who will be a member of one of the participating sets of chambers. As part of the scheme, mentees will be offered:

• Between three and five one-on-one meetings with their mentor.
• A workshop on applications for pupillage.
• Subject to developments in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic, one or more social events for mentors, mentees and members of the participating sets of chambers.

Joint Heads of Chambers Tim Ward QC and Philip Moser QC comment that “We’re delighted to be part of this great scheme, and to contribute to its growth. It plays an important role in making the profession more accessible for all.”

Applications will close at midday on 20 September 2021 (previously 6 September 2021).

Further information on the scheme, including the email address for the application form, can be found here and the application form here.

Congratulations to Josh Holmes QC, Julianne Kerr Morrison, Michael Armitage and Daisy Mackersie on their appointment to the CMA’s panel of counsel following an open competition. They join Rob Williams QC and Ben Lask, current Standing Counsel members from Monckton Chambers, bringing the number of Monckton appointees to six out of a total panel of eleven. All six Monckton members have appeared in some of the main challenges to regulatory competition decisions.

The CMA, the UK’s primary competition and consumer authority, is an independent non-ministerial government department with responsibility for carrying out investigations into mergers, markets and the regulated industries and enforcing competition and consumer law. The panel of counsel is intended to provide the CMA with a strong team of advocates and external legal advisers, who are enthusiastic about and committed to its work – but also able to give it detached and objective advice. The CMA has expanded its Standing Counsel to make sure it has the right number of members to assist in its work going forward. This reflects the growth in litigation undertaken by the CMA across all areas of activity as well as in anticipation of an increase in workload, following the UK’s departure from the EU and the establishment of the Office for the Internal Market and the Digital Markets Unit.

These appointments were made following an open competition with the consent of the Attorney General. They are for a term of 3 years with a possible extension of a further 3 years.
For further information, see CMA news release here.

The members of Monckton Chambers congratulate pupil barristers Clíodhna Kelleher and Dr Antonia Fitzpatrick on being invited to join Chambers following successful completion of pupillage. All are delighted they have accepted.

Prior to pupillage Antonia was Student Director of the School Exclusion Project. She was also, for six years, a member of St. John’s College and the History Faculty, University of Oxford, holding the positions of Junior Research Fellow and Departmental Lecturer in Medieval History.

Clíodhna Kelleher, a graduate of University College Dublin and Harvard Law School, was the recipient of the Irving R Kaufman Fellowship awarded by Harvard Law School and has won a number of debating championships including the John Smith Memorial Mace and the 2016 ‘Irish Times’ debate individual award.

Both Clíodhna and Antonia will become tenants on 01 October 2021.

The Lawyer has recognised William Hooper as its “Barrister of the Week” for his role in the Court of Appeal’s recent decision in the long-running Gregor Fisken Limited v Bernard Carl dispute, one of The Lawyer’s Top 15 appeals for 2021, which was about the ownership of the original gearbox of a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO sold for US$ 44m in 2018. See website news 28 May.

The Lawyer article leads on the fact that Will, at just seven years call, “pulled off a remarkable result by defeating not just one experienced silk in a high-profile dispute, but two.” Will trusted his long-standing familiarity with the matter: “I had to be adaptable and flexible,” he said. “Speaking of the the degree of press attention the case had attracted, Will said “I had done the prep and I knew the case backwards. I just had to focus on my submissions and treat it like any other case.”

“Barrister of the Week” is selected by The Lawyer’s Litigation Tracker team. Subscribers can access the full article here.

Drew Holiner has been appointed to the Panels of Arbitrators of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and the Korean Commercial Arbitration Board International (KCAB International), with immediate effect.

The SIAC commenced operations in 1991 as an independent, not-for-profit organisation, and has since established itself as one of the world’s leading arbitration institutions providing services to the global business community.  On 20 May 2021, the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation granted approval for the SIAC to be registered as a permanent arbitral institution under Russia’s Federal Law on Arbitration.  Read more here.

The KCAB was founded in 1966 and over the past 50 years has handled about 7,000 arbitration cases and 15,000 conciliation cases marking itself as a leading alternative dispute resolution centre.  On 20 April 2018, KCAB International was established as an independent division of the KCAB to meet the growing demand for cross-border commercial dispute resolution and focuses exclusively on international disputes, with offices in Seoul, Los Angeles, Hanoi and Shanghai.

The Lawyer has recognised Julianne Kerr Morrison as its “Barrister of the Week” for her role in the Court of Appeal’s recent decision to uphold Ofcom’s £50m fine of Royal Mail and its finding that Royal Mail abused its dominant position by obstructing rival Whistl from breaking into the wholesale market for bulk mail delivery services (See website news 07 May.) Julianne joined the dispute, three years ago, back when Ofcom was still drafting a decision in its initial investigation.

Julianne appeared for Ofcom alongside leading counsel Josh Holmes QC and Nikolaus Grubeck in the proceedings in which all parties– Royal Mail, Ofcom and Whistl – were represented by leading and junior counsel from Monckton Chambers. Julianne is reported as commenting that such in-chambers combat, common in competition disputes, is no more than “healthy rivalry” that makes you work harder. “It’s great to be up against your colleagues. You know what they’re capable of, so it really makes you focus on doing the job well when you know people that you respect and like are going to be putting their best foot forward as well.”

The Lawyer article also highlights Julianne’s varied caseload which includes working on an anti-trust claim involving Google’s shopping service, data protection matters involving sexual violence victims, and citizenship deprivation cases in which British individuals are being stripped of their citizenships due to alleged association to certain terror groups or for time spent in ISIS controlled areas.

“Barrister of the Week” is selected by The Lawyer’s Litigation Tracker team. Subscribers can access the full article here.