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Hendersons - Barristers' Chambers

Beatrice Graham

Call
2016

Beatrice has a broad practice across the range of Chambers’ specialisms and welcomes instructions as both sole and junior counsel. Beatrice has gained advisory and litigation experience in the County and High Court with a specific focus on product liability, group litigation, commercial and consumer law. Until the matter settled in 2022, she was instructed as junior counsel for the Claimants in the Volkswagen NOx Litigation which had the largest Claimant cohort under GLO management in England & Wales. She is currently seconded part-time to the Financial Services Disputes & Investigations team at TLT LLP. As sole counsel Beatrice has built significant experience of consumer credit work and is regularly instructed by well-known banks and financial providers.

Beatrice graduated from Trinity College, Oxford with a First Class degree in English Language & Literature. She went on to complete her professional qualifications at the University of Law and BPP Law School, joining Chambers in 2019.


For more information about the way barristers at Henderson Chambers work, including our terms of engagement, fee transparency statement and our complaints process, please click here.  Barristers are regulated by the Bar Standards Board.

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Expertise


Group Litigation

Until the matter settled in 2022, Beatrice was instructed as junior counsel (led by Oliver Campbell KC and Adam Heppinstall KC) for the Claimants in the Volkswagen NOx Emissions Group Litigation. The GLO made in this case managed the claims of one of the largest Claimant cohorts ever to proceed through group litigation in England & Wales. The case arose out of the factual context of the 2015 emissions scandal. Between 2019 and 2021 Beatrice was on a part-time secondment with one of the Claimant firms in the litigation where she assisted with a wide range of case management tasks and was able to gain experience of the running of group litigation of very significant size from the perspective of the managing solicitors. She then moved to become part of the substantial counsel team in which she assisted across all workstreams in the case from Lead Claimant selection and management, to disclosure, the making of interim applications, inter partes correspondence and the ongoing management of the case.

During pupillage, Beatrice assisted her supervisors in the Post Office Group Litigation which followed the now well-publicised Horizon Accounting scandal. In this action, over 500 Subpostmasters claimed against the Post Office in relation to its point of sale and IT accounting system. Beatrice attended the 4 week Common Issues Trial in the High Court and was involved in resisting the Post Office’s, ultimately unsuccessful, recusal application which attempted the removal of the managing judge, Fraser J.

Representative cases

grid list
  • The Volkswagen NOx Emissions Litigation: Preliminary Issues Judgment (Crossley & Ors v Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft) [2019] EWHC 783 (QB)
  • The Post Office Litigation: Preliminary Issues Judgment (Bates & Ors v Post Office Limited) [2019] EWHC 606 (QB)

Consumer Credit

Beatrice is regularly instructed as sole counsel for well-known banks, building societies, finance providers and lenders in consumer credit cases from pleadings to trial stage. She is currently seconded part-time to the Financial Services Disputes & Investigations team at TLT LLP.

Beatrice has gained extensive experience of claims brought under sections 140A and 140B of the Consumer Credit Act 1974. These are very often cases involving allegations of unfairness arising out of an alleged failure to disclose commission on PPI Policies paid to the Defendant. She also has experience of solar panel disputes, secret commission cases in mortgage and loan contexts and motor finance claims.

She is very familiar with judge led early neutral evaluations and dispute resolution hearings and also deals with all manner of procedural matters in consumer credit cases to include preliminary hearings, allocation hearings, direction hearings, strike out application hearings, relief from sanctions hearings, final hearings and trials and costs and case management hearings.

Beatrice is working with client banks and finance providers to develop flexible but considered tactics for dealing with the very large numbers of similar cases. By providing clear feedback following hearings, with particular emphasis on judicial comment, Beatrice is helping her instructing solicitors and their clients develop a strategic approach to particular types of claims.

Commercial

Beatrice has accepted instructions as junior counsel on behalf of a pharmaceutical company in a multi-million-pound Arbitration arising out of a contractual dispute linked to allegations of contamination.

Other recent examples include:

  • Advising with senior counsel in settlement negotiations relating to an economic tort claim.
  • Advising an internet provider in various interim and final hearings in proceedings issued by a vexatious litigant in person.
  • Business disputes over unpaid invoices.
  • Business disputed over disputed contractual interpretation.

Prior to joining Chambers, Beatrice had particular experience of commercial claims in the context of complex corporate trust structures and corporate insolvencies. She appeared on her own account in applications in the Central London County Court for extensions of time to register legal charges and debentures.

Health & Safety

Beatrice has advised and assisted in a range of health and safety matters both in her own right and as part of a larger team.

Recent examples include:

  • Representing an individual in a claim issued against two co-Defendants as a result of a work-place injury.
  • Attending a criminal trial of corporate co-Defendants accused of breaches of the Health and Safety etc. at Work Act 1974.
  • Attending a mention in preparation for sentencing on the behalf of a corporate co-Defendant who had pleaded guilty to a breach of the Health and Safety etc. at Work Act 1974.
  • Advising (in conjunction with leading counsel) a potential corporate Defendant in relation to an oil spill at a train depot.
  • Advising (in conjunction with leading counsel) in relation to a potential water polluting discharge claim against a corporate Defendant under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016.
  • Drafting of an application on behalf of a corporate Defendant to determine an issue of jurisdiction relating to whether the Office of Rail and Road was the appropriate prosecuting authority.
  • Preparation (in conjunction with leading counsel) of the statement of case in a claim relating to a hospital death as a result of suicide representing the hospital and advising as the possibility of joining medical staff as Part 20 Defendants.

EU Law

As a pupil, Beatrice assisted in the preparation of the respondent’s written submissions for the Supreme Court in R (on the application of the Association of Independent Meat Suppliers and another) v the Food Standards Agency, led by Sir Alan Dashwood KC and Adam Heppinstall KC. The case was the subject of a reference to the CJEU.

Property

Beatrice is regularly instructed on her own account in property disputes and has particular experience of representing Housing Associations. Her experience includes injunction applications, possession claims, and procedural matters in Landlord/Tenant claims. She is currently heavily involved in an ongoing multi-track dispute on behalf of a small business seeking a lease extension.

Other recent instructions include:

  • Advising in the settlement of a landlord tenant dispute where the landlord had become abusive.
  • Advising a freeholder on a potential property tribunal case against the self-appointed directors of the building’s RTM.
  • Advising in a frustration of lease contract case arising out of the Covid-19 pandemic.
  • Managing proceedings on an ongoing basis in a boatyard possession case against a litigation in person claimant who made allegations of damage to property in the context of significant rental arrears.
  • Drafting statements of case and advising in an ongoing nuisance case between a freeholder and leaseholder.
  • Drafting statements of case and attending a successful strike out hearing on a Defendant landlord’s behalf where a litigant in person tenant had pre-emptively issued a claim in order to deal with significant rental arrears.

 

Instructing Beatrice Graham

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Memberships
  • COMBAR
Education
  • BA in English Language & Literature, Trinity College, Oxford (First Class)
  • BPTC Major Scholarship from Inner Temple
Regulatory Information

All members of Chambers are registered with the Bar Standards Board of England and Wales. For our standard contractual terms click here.

For more information about the way barristers at Henderson Chambers work, including our fee transparency statement and our complaints process, please click here.

Bar Council Number: 67829

VAT Registration Number: 319108123

Legal Status: Barrister

Professional Insurance: All members of Chambers have professional liability insurance provided by the Bar Mutual Indemnity Fund Ltd. Territorial coverage is world-wide and subject to the term of the Bar Mutual. Click here for details.

Regulated by the Bar Standards Board.

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