< Barrister List

Andrew Spink QC

Called to bar 1985
Date of Silk 2003

Clerk Chris Gittins Tel: 020 7353 6381
Email Andrew Spink
vCard Andrew Spink

 

Andrew has 25 years' experience as an advocate in the civil courts and in the provision of technical and strategic legal advice to clients involved in complex civil litigation, whether as individuals, partnerships, companies, pension scheme trustees, employers and members, Government departments, or participants in multiparty group actions.

Variously described by solicitors or opponents interviewed by the legal directories in the 5½ years since he took silk as "highly valued", "seriously good", and "reliable, commercial and pragmatic", Andrew specialises principally in commercial, financial services, pensions and professional negligence dispute resolution, whether it be proposed or established litigation in the civil courts or cases for mediation or other forms of ADR. In the field of pensions he also provides advice to corporate and trustee clients in transactional and other non-litigious situations.

Andrew has extensive experience of group litigation and accepts public access work. Internationally, he is a registered advocate at the Dubai International Financial Centre.

Examples of recent Commercial work include a series of hard-fought actions against DEFRA in which Andrew has been acting for companies involved in the clean-up works following the 2000 and 2001 outbreaks in the UK of Swine Fever and Foot and Mouth, which have raised a large number of complex issues in the areas of contractual and statutory interpretation, corporate insolvency and assignment of causes of action. There have been two trips to the Court of Appeal, in both of which Andrew's client has been successful, most recently in March 2009 in relation to the recoverability of interest under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 and the Supreme Court Act 1981; a petition for leave to appeal on behalf of DEFRA is currently before the House of Lords for consideration.

Examples of Andrew's recent Financial Services work includes advising in relation to the group action brought by several hundred investors against Equitable Life involving allegations of mis-selling of with-profit pension annuities, advising in relation to a proposed claim arising out of advice given by an IFA to a high-earning senior academic member of a fully funded final salary pension scheme to leave the pension scheme and invest the transfer value in a SIPP, and advising in relation to allegations of negligence, breach of contract and statutory duty made against the financial services/wealth management departments of a number of banks by a group of investors whose assets were invested on their behalf by or on the advice of those banks in a collapsed Enhanced Variable Rate Fund marketed as an alternative to a cash deposit account.

In the field of Pensions, Andrew has been listed as a "Leading Silk" in both the two main legal directories ever since his appointment as a QC. In March 2009 he appeared in the Court of Appeal on behalf of the Respondent members in the leading equalisation case concerning the Foster Wheeler Pension Plan, he is currently acting in a number of significant ongoing or proposed Part 8 claims (e.g. in relation to the IMG Pension Plan, for hearing in October 2009 and in relation to the Pilots National Pension Fund, for hearing in January 2009) and he has recently advised the Government on its potential liability to contribute to the pension schemes of privatised former State-owned businesses as well as giving advice to employers and trustees of major schemes on the pensions implications of corporate acquisitions or restructuring.

Andrew's Professional Negligence practice focuses primarily on litigation involving pension scheme actuaries and other advisers (in 2005 he appeared on behalf of the trustee and employers of the Credit Lyonnais Pension Scheme at the trial of their action against Watson Wyatt and he advised the trustee and employers of the Philips Pension Plan from 2006 to 2009 in its recently successfully settled claim against Hewitt), as well as claims for clinical negligence against healthcare practitioners, where he is recognised as having a particular expertise in cases involving severe perinatal brain damage and where he is also listed as a "Leading Silk" in the legal directories.

Andrew has been a Civil Recorder since 2005 and was appointed a Deputy High Court Judge in 2008.

 

Areas of practice
Commercial & Business, Financial Services, Pensions, Professional Negligence, Clinical Negligence & Healthcare, Discipline & Regulatory,  Personal Injury, Public Access,

 

What the directories say

In both Legal 500 and Chambers & Partners
“Leading Silk”
“Highly valued”
“Reliable, commercial and pragmatic”
“Someone solicitors can present to clients with total ease of mind”
“On top of his game"
“A class advocate with a sound grasp of the issues”
“Pivotal to chambers, earning acclaim for his energy, commitment to client care and above all his superb litigation judgement”