Cloisters

Employment and discrimination; administrative and Public law; civil liberties.

Claire McCann specialises in employment, equality and public law as well as regulatory and human rights law. She is widely recognised for her incisive cross-examination skills, meticulous preparation, speed of response, and her ability to put clients at ease.

Highly regarded for her tenacity in court and commercial acumen, Claire is regularly instructed on behalf of companies, charities, public authorities and central government, trade unions and individuals.  She is accredited to be instructed under Direct Access. In 2021/22, she was appointed as a Recorder and as a Fee-paid Employment Judge.

She has a particularly strong reputation for her equality work, including non-employment discrimination cases and judicial reviews. She is also instructed in High Court employment-related litigation concerning restraint of trade and director’s duties. Claire has a strong advisory practice and is a sought-after junior in complex and high-profile litigation. Notable appellate cases include: Semenya v Switzerland (application to European Court of Human Rights on Switzerland's duties to secure protection for Caster Semenya's Convention rights in the context of sports arbitration); C v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (about transgender rights and informational privacy); Surtees v Middlesbrough Council (a seminal equal pay case about pay protection); and Elias v Secretary of State for Defence (one of the first cases in which the Court of Appeal considered the ambit of the race equality duty). Claire contributes to legal textbooks and articles to legal journals and lectures widely on employment law.

Claire joined Cloisters in 2000; she previously worked as a consultant for the Public Law Project where she co-authored a publication on access to health records; in 2005, she worked in the Human Rights Team of the Crown Law Office in New Zealand.

French.

ELA; ELBA; DLA; ALBA; and ILS

Wadham College, Oxford BA in English and French; Modern Languages (1st Class) and City University (Dip Law). Wadham College Scholar (1995/1996). Inner Temple Major Scholar (1998) and Princess Royal Scholar (1999). Pegasus Scholarship (2005).