Health and safety law
3PB offers considerable exceptional expertise in health and safety law, advising and handling both criminal and civil cases including taking them to appeal where appropriate. We assist clients with the interpretation of relevant legislation and have extensive experience of multi-party litigations and group actions.
3PB’s excellent team is respected for the high quality of its regulatory barristers at silk and junior levels. Its leading practitioners – for example David Richards, Nicholas Cotter, Tom Horder, and Sunyana Sharma – have significant expertise in complex health and safety, including those concerning fatalities and gross negligence/corporate manslaughter and where substantial fines and imprisonment are involved. The team’s barristers advise and represent clients in all manner of cases ranging from the minor regulatory breaches typically dealt with by magistrates to these larger, more serious and complex matters in the Crown Court and High Courts, often concerning workplace accidents, fire safety and exposure risks. 3PB barristers are also highly experienced in representing parties in coroners' inquests into fatal accidents.
Members are regularly sought out to prosecute for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and local authorities as well as to defend individuals, regulatory bodies, local authorities and major businesses. The team have been instructed in some of the leading recent cases and also provide advice on policy issues to companies, local authorities and other public bodies. Many combine their health and safety law practices with other specialisms and so are able to offer a wide range of expertise and experience to both private and public institutions.
The team draws upon the specialist knowledge and experience that its members have built up throughout this regulatory specialism. The team has strength in depth. We can assist where cases are complex and high profile - calling for the instruction of leading counsel or an experienced senior junior or where the demands of the case are met by the instruction of an up and coming junior with ability and interest in the field. Excellent trial advocacy, attention to detail, great preparation and expert technical knowledge can be relied upon from its barristers.
Our Public and Regulatory Barristers...
King's Counsel
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Junior Counsel
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3PB's crime and regulatory barrister Nicholas Cotter (pictured here) saw the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) drop its Section 7 HSWA Prosecution against a former employee of Crediton Dairy. The Dairy and another company had pleaded guilty and been fined for failing to remove asbestos correctly. However the HSE sought to continue its prosecution of the company employee, who had pleaded not guilty and the matter was proceeding to trial. However, after the production of...
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3PB crime and regulatory barrister David Richards prosecuted the first ever case of charges against the owner of an ocean rowing boat. SC, the owner of the Toby Wallace, recruited 6 novices to row the Atlantic in January/February 2016. With barely any training they set off. Tragically, on day 16 of the voyage one of the crew members MJ was washed overboard and lost at sea. When the case was referred to David Richards, pictured...
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3PB's specialist regulatory law barrister Nicholas Cotter (pictured here) with Phil Williams, of Blackfords LLP secured a not guilty result on the eve of the trial for pub landlady Mrs. Kellie McGarry who was facing prosecution by the HSE over the death of a customer. Mrs. Kellie McGarry who ran Rosehill Tavern, where Elaine Horrocks died after falling down the cellar steps more than four years ago, was charged with failing to do business to...
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3PB criminal and regulatory barrister Nick Cotter, pictured here, represented South Wales Safety Consultancy Ltd which was one of the defendants in a Crown Court trial, after a scaffolder was crushed to death when a church collapsed ahead of its demolition in Cardiff. This was a complex case concerning individual corporate defendants facing a range of offences and four contractors were given suspended prison sentences. Keith Young was the contractor in charge of the demolition,...
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3PB Barristers has welcomed top Silk Kevin McCallum QC (Scot), pictured here, a former criminal defence solicitor and a Procurator Fiscal Depute in Scotland - who specialises in criminal defence work, fatal accident inquiries and inquests - to the national chambers. He will work from its Inner Temple offices in London. Appointed as a Senior Advocate Depute in November 2006; Kevin was responsible for the preparation and conduct of a significant number of intensive, large...
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3PB’s specialist crime and regulatory law barrister, Graham Gilbert (pictured here) was recently successful in prosecuting the Holiday Inn Express, Dunstable for a health and safety breach. In November 2018, a Holiday Inn Express employee was instructed by a manager to empty and clean a commercial oil fryer in the kitchen. The member of staff picked up the filled container and was immediately burned from hot oil melting through the thin plastic container that had...
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3PB Barristers have created a dedicated webpage on its website to act as a hub for the many articles, briefings and webinar and podcast recordings about lockdown laws and regulations as well as practical issues like court attendance, e-bundles, remote and hybrid hearings. The Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic continues to create employment, contractual and other legal challenges which are in many ways unprecedented. The impact of the virus is being felt, and in response, 3PB have...
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David Richards, head of the marine group at 3PB and pupil barrister Dr Tagbo Ilozue have reviewed national and international maritime responses to the Covid 19 crisis, looking in particular at the UK regulatory framework that may be used to police responses to the coronavirus beyond the current lockdown. The two maritime barristers and co-authors suggest that shipowners and employers of seafarers are best advised to take account of the special features of coronavirus and...
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3PB’s Head of Chambers David Berkley QC is delighted to announce that criminal law barrister and child cruelty Silk, Ms Jo Martin QC, has joined 3PB as a door tenant. Jo qualified as a solicitor in 1996 before being called to the Bar in 2005 and becoming a QC last year. Prior to moving to Plymouth, Devon she worked for both the Crown Prosecution Service and the Serious Fraud Office in London and then became...
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Following a terrible fire at Newgrange Care Home in Hertfordshire, in which two elderly residents died, regulatory and health and safety barrister Nicholas Cotter acted for the care home manager Alison Wood. Mrs Wood pleaded not guilty to five Fire Reform Order offences. Significant expert evidence was then considered to help determine issues of causation, fire compartment, building regulations and regulatory fault in the tragic loss of life. The CPS indicated before trial that they would offer no...
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National chambers 3PB Barristers is delighted to announce the appointment of three of its barristers to the list of Specialist Regulatory Advocates in Health and Safety and Environmental Law. David Richards (call 1989), who recently acted in the Cheeki Rafiki case has been appointed to the panel’s A list. Elisabeth Bussey-Jones (call 1997), who has conducted over 200 inquests in her role as a coroner and Tom Horder (call 2004), who has represented parties in...
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Tom Horder has represented a building contractor in a HSE prosecution arising from damage to a gas main. During the subsequent repair works escaping gas ignited. On 6.11.18 At Folkstone Magistrates’ court Southern Gas Networks (the Co-defendant Company) was fined £1.2m and the building contractor £60,000. Click here to view Tom Horder's profile.
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Recommendations
Legal 500 2020
Regulatory, health and safety, and licensing: Members of 3PB are particularly experienced in health and safety cases, receiving both prosecution and defence instructions. Notable areas of specialism include maritime prosecutions and care home deaths, where David Richards and Nicholas Cotter are the key names to note respectively. Notable recent cases include Richards' prosecution of a yacht operator for the gross negligence manslaughter of four sailors lost at sea, and Cotter's defence of a care home after three patients died; the home was accused of negligent care following injuries sustained by the deceased upon falling out of a window.
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