Practice Areas
Clare’s practice focuses on high value and complex cases involving: (a) professional liability, (b) insurance, (c) disciplinary proceedings and (d) commercial litigation. She believes in taking a tough but commercial approach and relishes advocacy in all its forms.
Clare has acted in four matters which have gone to the Supreme Court: three in insurance and one in professional liability. This reflects the high value, high stakes, litigation which is at the heart of her practice. In the regulatory and disciplinary context, she has particular experience in actions against solicitors and barristers and has dealt with a range of allegations including financial and sexual misconduct.
She was the winner of the ‘Professional Negligence Junior of the Year’ (2019) award and shortlisted for the ‘Insurance Junior of the Year’ (2020) award by Chambers & Partners UK. She is ranked in the legal directories for Professional Negligence, Insurance and Professional Disciplinary and Regulatory Law.
Clare has appeared in a number of leading cases including:
• Innovate Pharmaceuticals Ltd v University of Portsmouth Higher Education Corporation [2024] EWHC 35. Acting for the University in a claim for breach of contract involving allegations of dishonesty. The claim was for about £100million but, following trial, the Judge found that there was no dishonesty and, even if there was, that the contract between the parties limited the University’s liability to £1million.
• Ickenham Travel Group Limited v Tiffin Green Limited [2024] EWHC 27. Successful defence following a trial of a claim against auditors arising out of their failure to identify a £4.5million understatement in the Claimant’s accounts.
• AIG Ltd v DCL [2023] Lloyd’s Rep IR 83. Claim by funders against a solicitor’s professional indemnity insurer for whom Clare acted struck out for falling within an exclusion in that policy.
• Matthew v Sedman [2022] AC 299. Clare appeared in the Supreme Court for the successful accountants on a limitation point.
• FCA v Arch [2021] UKSC 1. Acting for one of the insurers at first instance and in the Supreme Court in the FCA Test Case about the response of non-damage business interruption extensions to the COVID 19 pandemic.
• Allsop v Banner Jones [2021] EWCA Civ 7. Court of Appeal decision on the law of collateral attack.
• De Sena v Notaro [2020] EWHC 1031. Successful defence of accountants from a multi million pound claim following a four week trial.
• Avondale v AJG [2019] Lloyd’s Rep IR 104. Acting for the successful insurance broker in a trial involving issues of the scope of a broker’s duty of care and the need for expert evidence to establish a broker’s duties.
• Impact Funding v Barrington [2017] AC 73. Supreme Court decision on the interpretation of the trade debts exclusion in professional indemnity policies.
• Employers Liability Trigger Litigation [2012] 1 WLR 867. Supreme Court case concerning the interpretation of employers’ liability policies in mesothelioma cases.
