Andrew Mitchell QC
Call date
1992
Silk date
2011
Practice Areas
Andrew Mitchell is an experienced practitioner with an extensive commercial and civil practice, having particular expertise in:
- Banking and Financial Services
- Civil Fraud
- General commercial contract
- Insurance and Reinsurance
- Professional Negligence/Indemnity
- Employment
Recommendations (Practitioners’ Guides):
He is a recommended silk in the following areas:
- Banking and Finance
- Commercial Dispute Resolution
- Insurance
- Professional Negligence
Some recent quotations from the directories:
- Acknowledged as a “natural silk”, with “all the gravitas required”, and a “first-class advocate”. (Chambers UK, 2011, Banking and Finance)
- Produces “flawless performances in the court”, “exercises great judgement” and is a “strong personality”; (Chambers & Partners, 2010 – Banking and Finance)
- “technically outstanding and combines this with a high level of client focus” (Legal 500, 2010)
- He takes great efforts to be “always available” for his clients (Chambers UK 2011)
- “effective in court, very easy to work with” (Chambers UK 2011, Commercial Dispute Resolution)
- Not fazed by difficult cases, he “wins praise for ‘making the unbelievable looks legally credible’” (Chambers UK, 2011, Insurance)
- “He comes particularly recommended for his work on cases with elements of fraud” (Chambers UK, 2011, Professional Negligence)
- “As user-friendly as he is brilliant” (Chambers UK, 2011, Professional Negligence)
- “Solicitors seek him out regularly” (Chambers & Partners, 2010 – Banking and Finance)
- “Peers praise his outstanding work…and consider him to be a rising star with a first-rate legal mind” (Chambers & Partners, 2010 – Commercial Dispute Resolution)
- “impresses with his clear, forceful and persuasive approach” (Chambers & Partners, 2010 – Insurance)
- Andrew has a “strong personality and effective courtroom presence” (Chambers & Partners, 2010).
- He “really understands the commercial drivers behind a client’s business”(Legal 500, 2010).
Before he took silk in 2011, he was consistently recommended as a “Leading Junior” in legal directories in General Commercial Litigation; Banking and Finance and Insurance/Reinsurance.
In the year before he took silk, he was shortlisted by Chambers & Partners for the annual award as the Bar’s top Leading Junior in Banking.
Education:
Cambridge University (1987-1990) (M.A.) (First Class)
Oxford University (1990-1991) (B.C.L.) (First Class)
Professional Experience:
Andrew Mitchell is an experienced barrister who has been instructed in a number of the leading commercial litigation disputes of recent years.
(1) Banking and Finance: He has experience of the full range of international and domestic matters, including letters of credit, bills of exchange, consumer credit, electronic money transfers, mortgage indemnity guarantees, and insolvency. He has particular experience of freezing injunctions for/against banks, including NCIS-type problems and disclosure orders.
Clients include all the UK clearing banks; several other UK banks/building societies as well as overseas banks and similar institutions.
Andrew also has significant regulatory experience, having advised on non-contentious matters of compliance, such as COB/COBS; MCOB, ICOB, the UTCCR, PSD and CPD. He has drafted new terms and conditions for products.
In the regulatory field, Andrew has acted for the FSA in connection with the misselling of financial products; collective redress compensation schemes; and market abuse cases. He has acted against the FSA too, on a variety of matters, as well as against the Office of Fair Trading.
Recent cases include:
- Andrew was instructed as senior junior for Barclays in the successful Bank Charges Test Case (Commercial Court, Court of Appeal and House of Lords);
- Andrew successfully acted for Barclaycard in Carey v HSBC & Ors; and Sternlight v Barclays, the two leading Consumer Credit Act Test Cases (Mercantile Court).
- Andrew acted for Barclays and FirstPlus in the PPI litigation, having participated in the Test Case initiatives, and acted in the Commercial Court.
- A number of mis-selling cases for Lloyds Bank, where issues include alleged negligence, misrepresentation, breach of section 150 FSMA and Springwell/Titan and contractual estoppel (Bank Leumi and Standard Chartered Bank v Ceylon) allegations.
- Successful Commercial Court trial (2011) in J M Finn v McDonnell; case involving allegations of duty (Springwell etc.), negligence, breach of COBS and misselling.
- TMT v RBS. Ongoing case defending RBS against allegations that it wrongly allowed a corporate customer to trade complex (and allegedly unsuitable) freight options on the London Clearing House. Allegations include breach of COBS and other ‘systems’ based rules under the Handbook/FSMA.
- Arch Cru Investments. Ongoing case involving allegations against (among others) the authorised corporate director and fund managers of a series of OEIC investment funds, which invested in offshore closed cell companies. Allegations of misselling, e.g. by inaccurate prospectuses, on the basis that the investments were unsuitable and high risk. Breach of various provisions of FSMA and Handbook (including collective investment sourcebook) alleged.
- Wimbledon & Ors v RBS. Acted for RBS defending £10m + claim for breach of mandate.
- Bank of Scotland v Dundas & Wilson and Knight Frank. Ongoing Commercial Court, acting for Bank of Scotland, suing solicitors and valuers for professional negligence.
He has previously acted in Commercial Court disputes for Lehman Brothers and Dresdner Bank (Russian government bonds, and forex barrier options); and other transaction disputes arising from the credit crunch.
(2) Civil Fraud: Particular experience of asset-chasing and recovery cases, including jurisdiction/conflict of laws problems, restitution and constructive trust issues, and injunctions. Recent experience of (e.g.) insurance fraud (secret profits and commissions etc.), widespread mortgage fraud; and alleged timeshare frauds.
(3) Insurance and Reinsurance: Andrew has experience of both litigation and arbitration. Clients have included Lloyd’s of London itself; regularly act for Lloyd’s syndicates, company market insurers and reinsurers as well as policyholders and brokers.
Arbitrations are confidential. Recent court cases include:
- Meritz v. LSR and Cobra. Acted for brokers sued in respect of Korean shipbuilding insurance. Coverage and avoidance issues. Commercial Court.
- Mopani Copper v Emerald. International (re)insurance dispute, with conflict of laws and jurisdiction issues (England, South Africa, Zambia and Mauritius). Commercial Court.
Recent experience includes:
- hurricane damage claims
- personal payment insurance
- LMX spiral business litigation
- aircraft hull coverage disputes
- D&O coverage arbitration
- binding authority disputes
- goods in transit insurance
- residual value motor coverage litigation
- life assurance commission and overriders.
(4) Professional Negligence/Indemnity: Considerable experience in claims against (for example):
- solicitors
- accountants
- valuers
- mortgage administrators
- banks
- share registrars
- insurance and other brokers
- financial advisers
- estate agents
Recent cases include acting for the former Safeway board in the test case Safeway v Twigger (Court of Appeal, 2011) concerning the application of the defence of ex turpi to claims for an indemnity in respect of quasi-criminal competition fines allegedly incurred because of breach of duty/professional negligence.
Andrew was also recently instructed on behalf of Grant Thornton in defending the first ever claim for breach of duty under the Proceeds of Crime Act, brought against a management receiver (Sidhu v ARCO).
(5) Employment: Andrew Mitchell specialises in high value commercial employment cases, mostly involving City banks, brokers and other financial sectors, which require commercial litigation expertise as much as knowledge of employment law. He has particular experience in bonus cases, and injunction cases in City related fields (broker and other team “defections” etc.).
Publications:
Editor of Commercial Court Procedure (Sweet and Maxwell).
Prizes & Scholarships:
The George Long Prize for Jurisprudence (1990): awarded to the candidate with the highest marks in Cambridge University Final Examinations
The Dicey & Morris Prize (1991) awarded in the Oxford BCL examinations for the candidate with the highest marks in private international law
Harmsworth Scholar of the Middle Temple (1991)
Bar Council Prize for “outstanding” performance in Bar Finals (1992)
Middle Temple Certificate of Honour (1992)
Other Qualifications:
Andrew Mitchell is a CEDR Accredited Mediator.