Malcolm Birdling > Brick Court Chambers > London, England > Barrister Profile

Malcolm Birdling

020 7379 3558 malcolm.birdling@brickcourt.co.uk

Position

Malcolm is a junior barrister with a litigation practice specialising in all aspects of public, administrative, EU and commercial dispute resolution. Malcolm’s recent public and administrative work includes acting for the claimant in R (Holmcroft Properties Ltd) v KPMG LLP [2016] EWHC 323 (Admin) (one of “The Lawyer’s” top 20 cases of 2016) and for the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs before the Supreme Court in R (Sandiford) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs [2014] 1 WLR 2697. Highlights of Malcolm’s recent commercial work include appearing unled before the Court of Appeal in British Gas Trading Ltd v Oak Cash and Carry Ltd [2016] EWCA Civ 153, and acting as sole junior counsel for the Claimants (led by Jonathan Hirst QC) in a Hong Kong seated international arbitration relating to a dispute arising under a Directors’ and Officers’ liability insurance policy. Malcolm also regularly appears before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, most recently in R v Pora [2015] UKPC 9, Times, April 20, 2015, Bimini Blue Coalition Ltd v Prime Minister of The Bahamas & Ors [2014] UKPC 23, Taylor v R [2013] 1 WLR 1144 and R v Lundy [2013] UKPC 28; (2013) Times, December 10.

Career

Qualified New Zealand Bar; judge’s clerk (judicial assistant) to Sir Grant Hammond at the New Zealand Court of Appeal; research fellow and tutor in law (specialising in constitutional and European Union law) Keble College, University of Oxford 2008-2011; called 2011, Inner Temple. Publications of note: ‘Competition Law: General Principles in Vaughan and Robertson’s Encyclopaedia of EU Law’ (co-author); ‘Delays and Stays’, New Zealand Law Journal (2009), p253 ff (co-author); ‘Self Incrimination comes to Strasbourg’, International Journal of Evidence & Proof (Vol 12, 2008), p58 ff; ‘Filtering and the International System: A Question of Commitment’ in Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering (MIT Press, 2008) (co-author); ‘Healing the Past or Harming the Future? Large Natural Groupings and the Waitangi Settlement Process’ New Zealand Journal of Public and International Law (Vol 2, No 2 2004), p259 ff; ‘Making Sense of the Foreshore and Seabed’ (Wellington, 2004) (co-author).

Memberships

ALBA (Executive Committee Member); COMBAR.

Education

University of Oxford (2007 BCL (Distinction); 2008 MPhil (Law); 2012 DPhil (Law). Victoria University of Wellington (2003 BA Political Science, LLB (1st))