Brendan McGurk KC > Monckton Chambers > London, England > Barrister Profile
Monckton Chambers Offices
1 & 2 RAYMOND BUILDINGS, GRAY'S INN
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Brendan McGurk KC
Position
Brendan is a leading junior with a wealth of experience in Commercial, Public law and Regulatory disputes. He offers expertise across Chambers’ core areas and he is in equal demand amongst public and private clients in Judicial Review, EU, Competition, Procurement, and Tax litigation. In addition, he regularly acts in Financial Services, Insurance, Sport and Professional Negligence disputes. His intellectual rigour, hard work and commercial common sense has resulted in a thriving advisory practice. Brendan is personable and persuasive and is regularly instructed in his own right as both a trial advocate and an appellate advocate. In addition, he has been an integral team member in several high-value commercial disputes. Brendan was appointed to the Attorney-General’s A Panel in July 2017. In March 2019 Hart published Brendan’s new book ‘Data Profiling and Insurance Law’ which considers the legal implications of Insurers’ use of personal data in underwriting and claims decisions and which won the prestigious British Insurance Law Association book prize for 2020. He is co-author of Professional Indemnity Insurance, the second edition of which was published in February 2016 by Oxford University Press and the chapter on UK Merger Control (with Ben Rayment) in Weinberg and Blank on Takeovers and Mergers. In addition, Brendan has published several articles on Insurance and Competition law. Brendan is an affiliate lecturer in Competition Law at Cambridge University and teaches Article 102 on the LLM course.
Career
Called 2004. He was called to the Bar of Northern Ireland in 2015 and to the Bar of Ireland in 2018.
Before coming to the Bar, Brendan held a lectureship in Constitutional and Administrative Law at Wadham College in the University of Oxford. He is now an associate lecturer in Competition Law at Cambridge University.
Education
Brendan obtained First Class Honours as an Undergraduate at Cambridge and as a Postgraduate at Oxford. His D.Phil was supervised by Professor John Gardner and is entitled ‘The Rule of Law in the Regulatory State’. He was short-listed for a Prize Fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford in 2003, won a Queen Mother’s Major Scholarship in 2004 and a Bar European Group Scholarship in 2006. Before coming to the Bar, Brendan held a lectureship in Constitutional and Administrative Law at Wadham College in the University of Oxford.
Lawyer Rankings
London Bar > Professional negligence
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan McGurk KC –Monckton Chambers
‘Quietly impressive, always available and humble.’
London Bar > European Union law
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan is an excellent advocate – extremely eloquent. He has an encyclopaedic knowledge of CJEU case law.’
Monckton Chambers is a leading set for EU law, with extensive expertise in both the silk and junior ranks. Members are well known for appearing before prominent EU institutions in complex cases. Josh Holmes KC and Jack Williams continue to act for plastic manufacturing company Symphony in its longrunning damages claim against various EU institutions, regarding losses caused by the institutions’ ban on the sale of oxo-degradable plastic products. Brendan McGurk KC is well versed in advising on cases involving chemicals and phytosanitary regulatory matters. The senior end of the team was recently bolstered by the elevation of Ben Lask KC to silk in March 2023.
London Bar > Public procurement
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan has an incisive eye and cuts straight to the key issues in a case.’
Monckton Chambers is home to a team of ‘highly talented practitioners‘ in the public procurement arena. Recent work for the group includes Philip Moser KC appearing for orthodontic company Braceurself in seeking permission to appeal against the judgment made by the High Court in Braceurself Limited v NHS England, concerning a procurement process made by the NHS for orthodontic services. The key issue of the case was that although the contracting authority was found to have committed a committed a manifest error of assessment in its scoring of Braceurself’s tender and, absent the error, the claimant would have won the tender. However, the breach was not considered ‘sufficiently serious’ to warrant an award for damages to be made to the claimant. The claimant was granted permission to appeal the judgment to the Court of Appeal. In a separate matter, Brendan McGurk KC, unled, successfully acted for technology provider Bromcom in a challenge to the award of a contract for the supply of a Cloud Management Information System to a prominent education charity.
London Bar > Competition
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan McGurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan is highly knowledgeable in matters relating to judicial review, public procurement and linked competition issues.’
London Bar > Administrative law and human rights
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan McGurk KC –Monckton Chambers ‘An excellent advocate, extremely smooth and persuasive. His written work is also superb, with excellent drafting and clear, concise advice.’
London Bar > Tax: VAT and excise
(2024 Silks)Ranked: Tier 1Brendan Mcgurk KC – Monckton Chambers ‘Brendan is technically very strong indeed; his ability to turn around complex pleadings quickly is very impressive and his client management is extremely good, reassuring clients and lay clients in particular. His advocacy in relation to complex tax matters is impressive in that he has great clarity in explaining all the necessary detail.’