Region Area

Barristers

Brendan McGurk KC

Brendan McGurk KC

Position

Brendan is a leading junior with a wealth of experience in Commercial, Public law and Regulatory disputes. He offers expertise across Chambers’ core areas and he is in equal demand amongst public and private clients in Judicial Review, EU, Competition, Procurement, and Tax litigation. In addition, he regularly acts in Financial Services, Insurance, Sport and Professional Negligence disputes. His intellectual rigour, hard work and commercial common sense has resulted in a thriving advisory practice. Brendan is personable and persuasive and is regularly instructed in his own right as both a trial advocate and an appellate advocate. In addition, he has been an integral team member in several high-value commercial disputes. Brendan was appointed to the Attorney-General’s A Panel in July 2017. In March 2019 Hart published Brendan’s new book ‘Data Profiling and Insurance Law’ which considers the legal implications of Insurers’ use of personal data in underwriting and claims decisions and which won the prestigious British Insurance Law Association book prize for 2020. He is co-author of Professional Indemnity Insurance, the second edition of which was published in February 2016 by Oxford University Press and the chapter on UK Merger Control (with Ben Rayment) in Weinberg and Blank on Takeovers and Mergers. In addition, Brendan has published several articles on Insurance and Competition law. Brendan is an affiliate lecturer in Competition Law at Cambridge University and teaches Article 102 on the LLM course.

Career

Called 2004. He was called to the Bar of Northern Ireland in 2015 and to the Bar of Ireland in 2018.

Before coming to the Bar, Brendan held a lectureship in Constitutional and Administrative Law at Wadham College in the University of Oxford. He is now an associate lecturer in Competition Law at Cambridge University.

Education

Brendan obtained First Class Honours as an Undergraduate at Cambridge and as a Postgraduate at Oxford. His D.Phil was supervised by Professor John Gardner and is entitled ‘The Rule of Law in the Regulatory State’. He was short-listed for a Prize Fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford in 2003, won a Queen Mother’s Major Scholarship in 2004 and a Bar European Group Scholarship in 2006. Before coming to the Bar, Brendan held a lectureship in Constitutional and Administrative Law at Wadham College in the University of Oxford.

Mentions

London Bar

Administrative law and human rights

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC –Monckton Chambers 'He has judges eating out of his hands with his encyclopaedic knowledge of case law and legislation.'
London Bar

Agriculture

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC - Monckton Chambers
London Bar

Aviation and Travel

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers 'Very thorough knowledge of the sector and the surrounding legislation, particularly as it intersects with competition law. User friendly and responsive. Provides clear and strategic advice.'
London Bar

Competition

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan is very thorough knowledgeable of competition law; very strategic; extremely pragmatic and excellent with clients.’
London Bar

Education

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Brendan McGurk KC  - Monckton Chambers
London Bar

European Union relations

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan is exceptional bright. His ability to quickly assimilate detail is second to none. He adds real value and consistently achieves tangible results in complex matters.'
London Bar

Professional negligence

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC –Monckton Chambers
London Bar

Public procurement

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Absolutely fantastic. Brendan’s technical knowledge is vast. He has a great ability to absorb considerable amounts of information, often very technical either legal or mechanics and to have that ready at his finger tips. His preparation for trial is some of the very best and most detailed.’
London Bar

Tax: VAT and excise

New Silks1
Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘A leader in the field and fully deserves silk. Both written and oral advocacy is first-rate.’