Employment and discrimination; professional discipline.
Barrister specialising in all aspects of employment law (including transfer of undertakings, equal pay, discrimination, whistleblowing, unfair/wrongful dismissal and industrial relations) as well as professional disciplinary proceedings.
Called 1997; Gray’s Inn; in private practice since 1998; has specialised exclusively in employment law since 2001.
Debbie has a balance of claimant and respondent work which covers all aspects of employment and discrimination law, as well as business protection and trade union law. She appears in the Court of Appeal, the Employment Appeal Tribunal, the High Court and County Courts, as well as the Employment Tribunal and SEND Tribunal.
Debbie represents parties from public and private sectors. Her work regularly involves complex cases of whistleblowing, health and safety, discrimination, TUPE and related matters, as well as claims in respect of restrictive covenants and directors / fiduciary duties. She is experienced in dealing with equal pay litigation and has been involved in very large public sector equal pay claims on behalf of both local authority employers and groups of employees, as well as private sector claims relating to large clearing banks.
She advises in respect of trade union matters, including issues relating to recognition, collective agreements and industrial action.
Debbie has particular expertise in the area of overlap between employment and insolvency law.
She also advises and appears in the Special Educational Needs (“SEND”) Tribunal and undertakes civil Equality Act claims in respect of the matters such as the provision of services and education.
Debbie`s employer clients include Local Authorities, NHS Trusts, schools, clearing banks, large national and multi-national businesses and a large number of solicitors` firms, who appreciate her commercial outlook, pragmatism and ability to quickly get to the heart of the problem and find solutions which work for their organisations.
Her employee clients include professionals from various sectors, from celebrity chefs and football club directors to medical professionals, senior public and private sector directors and employees and legal and HR professionals.
She is regularly instructed to advise in relation to TUPE transfers, restructuring and redundancy processes and changing terms and conditions.
Debbie is renowned for her exceptional client care skills, forensic attention to detail and is a highly respected advocate. She is consistently ranked as a Band 1 barrister by both Legal 500 and Chambers UK and is actively involved with the key employment law professional groups and associations.
Debbie is on the EHRC Panel of approved barristers.