Park Square Barristers

Based in the heart of the legal quarter of Leeds, Park Square Barristers has changed the face of advocacy in the North East and we have now strengthened our set even further with our new office in Middlesbrough, former Old Court Chambers.

It is the largest multidisciplinary set on the North Eastern Circuit offering the highest standards of advice, representation, mediation and legal training. It has a client-focused ethos and is committed to providing excellent service, countrywide, to legal firms (from high street to international), insurance companies, local authorities and other public and regulatory bodies including HMRC, BIS, NHS Protect and the Environment Agency. Many accept Direct Access instructions. Members and clients enjoy the benefits of highly experienced, responsive and supportive clerking and support teams.

The teams share best practice, knowledge and expertise for the benefit of clients and junior members. The strength of the membership means hearings can be covered at short notice and enables the set to provide a one-stop service for clients, where cases cross into other specialist areas.

A number of members have been appointed to specialist panels, including the Attorney General, Treasury Solicitor, insurance companies, health trusts, CPS Specialist Fraud, POCA, RASSO and Serious Organised Crime panels. In 2016 PSQB was instructed to prosecute what is understood to be the first gross negligence manslaughter case concerning food allergies and the first private prosecution of a fraudulent ‘cash for crash’ staged road traffic accident, for which it received the Personal Injury Award 2016 for ’Outstanding Case of the Year’.

Types of work undertaken
Commercial and company: insurance, including indemnity and recovery, banking, finance, insolvency, company, including formation of companies through to dissolution, unfair prejudice, minority shareholders, sale and carriage of goods, travel and package holiday claims, product liability, defamation, international disputes and letters of credit, professional negligence, restraint of trade, intellectual property, partnership disputes, guarantees/indemnities, travel, tourism and package holidays, timeshares and mis-selling.

Court of Protection: vulnerable adults, consent to treatment, deprivation of liberty, deputyship, property and finance, capacity, accommodation, contact, residence, consent to marriage and sexual relationships.

Costs: all aspects of costs in all jurisdictions.

Crime: prosecutes and defends every type of case from the Magistrates’ to the Supreme Court. Significant expertise in murder, manslaughter, terrorism, serious violence, rape and other sexual offences (including historical), public disorder, dishonesty, large-scale conspiracies, drugs, technical road traffic issues, plus more unusual offences dealt with by specialist prosecuting agencies. Specialisms of asset forfeiture, confiscation and cash detention and restraint.

Education: special educational needs and disability, EHC plans, admissions, exclusions.

Employment: wrongful dismissal, discrimination, restrictive covenants, redundancy; TUPE; equal pay; wages; Working Time Regulations and contractual claims.

Family (children and finance): care, particularly the most serious and medically complex cases, such as serious injury or death, neglect, abuse, fictitious illness, adoption and special guardianship, child abduction, child arrangements, injunctions and committals, domestic violence, forced marriage, terrorism and jurisdiction disputes. The set represents the full range of clients: local authorities, parents, extended family and children. Other work includes matrimonial and non-matrimonial finance, divorce, financial remedies, cohabitation, pre-nuptial agreements.

Fraud: nationally renowned for civil fraud work, with unparalleled depth and breadth of experience. An outstanding national reputation for defence work within the insurance sector. Expertise in extensive criminal frauds, including VAT, Revenue and Customs. A number of members are on the Serious Fraud Office specialist panel.

Health and safety: advocacy and advisory work in cases involving the Health and Safety Executive, the Environment Agency, Food Standards Agency, Medicine and Healthcare Products Regulatory Authority, and smaller local regulators such as fire and rescue authorities and environmental health authorities, for the regulator, businesses and individuals.

Inquests and inquiries: experience of representing families, interested persons in the coroner’s court and healthcare professionals (doctors, nurses, midwives, dentists and pharmacists), accountants and police officers before their professional bodies.

Mediation and ADR: mediation specialists dealing with the full range of disputes involving property, including landlord and tenant, boundaries and rights of way, families and family finance, business agreements, employment, leases, neighbour disputes, personal injury, professional negligence, probate and trusts, company disputes and insolvency.

Personal injury and clinical negligence: accidents abroad, catastrophic injury, birth injuries, cerebral palsy, pediatric cardiac surgery, dental, cosmetic and orthopedic surgery, obstetrics, failures in proper diagnoses, reduced life expectancy, group actions, including the Mau Mau litigation, complex and high-profile cases, road traffic, occupiers’ and employers’ liability, industrial disease, asbestos-induced mesothelioma. The team also acts for parties in linked inquests and HSE prosecutions.

Professional negligence: expertise in all aspects of litigation and advisory work in relation to claims against professionals, up to and including final hearing on issues such as duty of care, breach of duty or contract, causation and quantification of loss, claims both for and against solicitors, barristers, insolvency practitioners, surveyors, architects, engineers, accountants, financial advisers, bankers, insurance brokers and other professionals.

Property: agricultural tenancies, boundary disputes, buildings including listed buildings, commercial leases, easements and rights of way, planning, right to light, adverse possession, trespass, nuisance, village greens and commons, landlord and tenant disputes including commercial and residential, such as possession, dilapidations, terminal obligations, and public sector housing management, including anti-social behaviour injunctions, committal, and homelessness.

Private client: property, trusts, wills and probate, Inheritance Act, Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees (TOLATA).

Private prosecution: advise on and pursue committal proceedings for contempt of court and private prosecutions at various stages of litigation. Both in relation to fraudulent civil matters and criminal proceedings such as the production and sale of counterfeit goods, fraud / abuse of position of trust etc.

Public and administrative law: judicial review and challenging decisions concerning community care, education, health, housing, mental health, VAT and customs and excise.