Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC > 1 Crown Office Row A1 > London, England > Barrister Profile

1 Crown Office Row A1
1 Crown Office Row
TEMPLE, LONDON
EC4Y 7HH
England

Position

Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC is a leading practitioner in Clinical Negligence and Personal Injury claims. Lizanne has a distinguished reputation for representing Claimants with highly complex claims for catastrophic injury. In clinical negligence she has particular expertise and experience in birth damage and neo-natal claims but acts in claims arising in a wide range of circumstances.  In personal injury she acts for Claimants with head injuries, spinal injuries and other complex multiple injuries.

Lizanne’s work also involves multi-party actions and she recently acted for over 700 Claimants in the litigation against Mr Ian Paterson, Spire Healthcare and HEFT. Lizanne has also been instructed in a number of multi-party actions arising out of sexual abuse and physical abuse of children and adults in institutions including the Jimmy Savile litigation and the Winterbourne View claims. Claims against private hospitals, the catholic church and local authorities have involved a number of cases which have resulted in the development of the law in respect of vicarious liability.

Career

Qualified 1974; silk 1999; co-author of ‘Child Abuse Compensation Claims’ (Jordans); co-author ‘Clinical Negligence (A Practitioner’s Handbook)’ (Oxford University Press).

Memberships

Personal Injury Bar Association; Family Law Bar Association; Professional Negligence Bar Association, APIL; AvMA.

Education

Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford (1975 MA Politics, Philosophy and Economics); Bar Finals (1974).

Lawyer Rankings

London Bar > Clinical negligence

(Leading Silks)Ranked: Tier 1

Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC1 Crown Office Row ‘Lizanne is an absolute powerhouse. Her knowledge is unrivalled.’

The ‘brilliant set of counsel’ at 1 Crown Office Row cover claims concerning health care in England and Wales and beyond. A strong track record in multi-party claims, such as the Ian Paterson scandal and mesh litigation, are characteristic of the set. Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC has notable experience in birth injury cases, including CDE v Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, in which the claimant, born by caesarean section, suffered hypoxic ischaemia. Philip Havers KC also has experience in this area, as does John Whitting KC whose recent case of Yapp v Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust raises issues regarding whether compensation should persist after the death of the claimant parents and for the lifetime of the child. The set also has expertise in international cases, advising on litigation in Jersey, Hong Kong and other jurisdictions.

London Bar > Personal injury, industrial disease and insurance fraud

(Leading Silks)Ranked: Tier 1

Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC1 Crown Office Row ‘Hugely experienced, fantastic work ethic, good with clients.’

1 Crown Office Row are a ‘very experienced set‘, going ‘the extra mile’ for both claimant and defendant clients, with wide health law experience and crossover inquest and child abuse expertise. Elizabeth-Anne Gumbel KC has standout strength in abuse work, notably in the last year leading Justin Levinson for the claimants in both HXA v Surrey County Council and YXA v Birmingham CC, both cases in which claimants had been abused in their family homes and not removed by social services despite records and reports of this abuse documented. Both claims were reinstated in these second appeals, having been struck out previously. Henry Witcomb KC has notable experience in cross-border multi-party actions.