Practice Profile
Personal Injury
Michael is a personal injury specialist whose practice is equally divided between Defendants (Insurers and Local Authorities) and Claimants with an emphasis on employers’ liability claims. He has particular expertise in industrial disease claims (WRULD’s, ONIHL and HAVS) most notably those in relation to asbestos exposure, with a significant proportion of such work involving fatal claims. Michael’s expertise in industrial disease litigation is reflected in the fact that he has been ranked nationally in such field by “Chambers UK– A Client’s Guide to the Legal Profession” in 2010 and again in 2011. In addition, he regularly undertakes high-value claims in respect of severe multiple injury and has experience of clinical negligence claims.
Recent examples of his work include:
(a) Successful claim in the QBD to extend the period within which Claimants were able to seek further damages in respect of provisional awards made to them in the late 1980’s in respect of asymptomatic pleural plaques from a period of 20 years to the remainder of their life. The claim involved issues in relation to whether such applications required to be made prospectively or retrospectively and whether or not the original compromise agreements which led to the provisional awards were in any event valid in view of the fact that asymptomatic pleural plaques do not now constitute an injury. Argument centred on whether the original compromise agreements were void due to mutual mistake as to the law.
(b) Successful claims and group-settlement in respect of 12 Claimants in relation to a novel and contentious form of WRULD, namely chronic compartment syndrome of the upper limbs.
(c) Successful claim in respect of severe multiple injuries suffered in a road traffic accident. Settlement reached at £350,000 on the basis of a provisional award.
Michael is a certified mediator.
EDUCATION
• King’s College, University of London LLB (2:1)
MEMBERSHIPS
• Personal Injury Bar Association
• Welsh Personal Injury Lawyers Association
POSTS
• Junior Counsel to the Crown (Provincial Panel) (2000-2007)
• Pupil Supervisor and Head of Pupillage Committee
DIRECTORY ENTRIES
Michael has been recommended in respect of personal injury litigation in the Legal 500 Directory annually since 2000 and in Chambers UK – A Client’s Guide to the Legal Profession annually since 2003.
He continues to be “highly rated” in the 2011 edition of the Legal 500. In the 2011 Edition of Chambers UK, Michael is rated in “Band 1” in respect of personal injury and described as “excellent in conference, very accessible and able to deal beautifully with clients from all walks of life “.He is known for his “determination to maximize settlements” and that he “never approaches cases in a perfunctory manner”. In respect of Industrial Disease work, Michael is ranked nationally by Chambers UK appearing in its “Spotlight table”.
