Our Expertise

Currently nominated for the prestigious ‘Insurance Set of the Year 2022’ award by Chambers & Partners UK, 4 New Square have considerable expertise in all areas of insurance law. Insurance and reinsurance is a core area of the practices of many members of chambers.

‘4 New Square has an impressive bench of silks and junior barristers with expertise spanning a broad spectrum of insurance and reinsurance matters, supplemented by its renowned professional negligence pedigree. Members of the set represent a strong choice for technically challenging coverage issues and are particularly renowned for their expertise in disputes involving property damage, professional indemnity and product liability matters. They act for defendants and claimants, including a range of corporates across the real estate and energy sectors. Tenants were instructed in Financial Conduct Authority v Arch Insurance and Others, the test case brought by the FCA to determine whether certain business interruption policies would respond to COVID-19 losses.’– Chambers & Partners

‘4 New Square is a well-established major player in insurance and reinsurance work. The set has ‘outstanding practitioners at all levels and the clerks are organised, competent, responsive and efficient’.’ – Legal 500

Listed as one of the leading sets for Insurance by Chambers & Partners and Legal 500, members of Chambers are involved in advising insurers and insureds in many of the most high profile issues of the day.  Our work in this area extends across a wide range of issues, including issues of construction, the scope of indemnity, the effectiveness and scope of notifications and claims, non-disclosure, misrepresentation, breach of the duty of fair presentation, breach of warranty, breach of conditions precedent, fraud, co-insurance, aggregation and the inter-relationship between different layers of insurance. And it covers the full range of insurance, including various types of liability insurance (D&O, employers, public, product and professional indemnity), insurance of property, contractors all risks insurance, financial risk and legal expenses insurance, life insurance and reinsurance.  Our expertise in areas such as construction, product liability, professional liability and property damage provides a natural cross-over with the related areas of insurance.

We have been instructed to advise and act about disputes as to coverage arising from recent events such as the Grenfell Tower tragedy and Covid19 having existing experience and expertise in the types of insurance policies involved.

We appear in trials and appeals in England and Wales and overseas. We also act as counsel and as arbitrators in arbitrations.

4 New Square runs its own insurance blog Insurance Law London, dedicated to recent developments and decisions in insurance law and practice.

Members of chambers have authored Informa’s Insurance Year in review for several years (click here for 2019’s edition). Some members are authors of specialist books and chapters on professional indemnity insurance and insurance claims.  Insurance Claims (5th Ed) is written by Alison Padfield KC and is published by Bloomsbury Professional.

Recent cases involving members of chambers include:

• Arch Insurance & others v Financial Conduct Authority [2021] UKSC 1 (otherwise known as ‘The FCA Test Case’) – a Supreme Court decision following an expedited trial under the Financial Markets Test Case Scheme and an expedited leap-frog appeal to the Supreme Court, concerning the response of various insurance policies to business interruption losses arising from the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Sartex Quilts & Textiles Ltd v Endurance at Lloyds [2020] EWCA Civ 208 – Court of Appeal decision concerning the indemnification on the reinstatement basis.
• Euro Pools Plc v. Royal and Sun Alliance Plc [2019] EWCA Civ 808: Court of Appeal decision concerning notifications to professional indemnity insurance policies.
• R&S Pilling (t/a Phoenix Engineering) v UK Insurance Ltd [2019] UKSC 16; [2019] 2 W.L.R. 1015: Supreme Court decision on motor insurance.
• Liverpool Victoria Insurance Ltd v Cameron ([2019] 1 WLR 1471) – a Supreme Court decision on alternative service on “persons unknown” and/or their insurers, and raises interesting possibilities concerning dispensing with service.
• AIG Europe Ltd v Woodman [2017] UKSC 18; [2017] 1 W.L.R. 18: Supreme Court decision on aggregation under the Solicitors’ Minimum Terms.
• Teal Assurance Co Ltd v WR Berkley Insurance (Europe) Ltd (No.2) [2017] EWCA Civ 25; [2017] Lloyd’s Rep IR 259: Test for ascertainment under liability insurance where money was paid into and out of an escrow account to fund remedial works.
• Impact Funding Solutions Ltd v Barrington Support Services Ltd [2016] UKSC 57; [2017] A.C. 73: Construction of exclusion clause in Solicitors’ Minimum Terms.
• Western Trading Ltd v Great Lakes Reinsurance (UK) Plc [2016] EWCA Civ 1003; [2016] Lloyd’s Rep IR 643: The measure of indemnity and appropriate remedy under a policy of fire insurance when the insured had yet to reinstate the building destroyed by fire.