Cain Ormondroyd > Francis Taylor Building > London, England > Barrister Profile

Francis Taylor Building
FRANCIS TAYLOR BUILDING, INNER TEMPLE
LONDON
EC4Y 7BY
England

Work Department

  • Rating
  • Planning
  • Adminstrative and Public
  • Local Government
  • Ecclesiastical

Position

Cain Ormondroyd practices in the fields of public and planning law, with a particular focus on heavyweight land valuation disputes and contentious planning appeals

He combines work in these areas with an interest in several specialist areas including highways, commons and village greens, listed buildings, planning enforcement and ecclesiastical law.  He is an acknowledged expert in the area of rating and the council tax, being one of the editors of Ryde on Rating and also the author of The Rating and Council Tax Pocketbook.   Cain is ranked in ‘Band 1’ by the Chambers and Partners Directory for his work in this area and described as ‘a go-to practitioner for rating appeals’.  He was named as Government and Third Sector Junior of the Year 2022 by the Legal 500 Bar Awards.

Cain acts for a broad range of clients including major public companies, developers, central and local government bodies.  He is a member of the Attorney General’s ‘A’ Panel of specialist counsel and is often instructed by HMRC.  He appears most frequently at hearings in the Valuation Tribunal, Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber) and High Court and at public inquiries, but has appeared in and accepts instructions to appear in all courts from the magistrates’ court up to the Supreme Court.

He is also a member of the Planning and Environment Bar Association, the National Infrastructure Planning Association and the Compulsory Purchase Association.

Career

Called to the Bar,  2007

Memberships

  • Attorney General’s A Panel of approved counsel
  • CPA
  • NIPA
  • PEBA

Education

  • Magdalen College, University of Oxford – B.A. (Hons) in Modern History (First class)
  • UWE, Bristol – CPE (Distinction), BVC (Outstanding, top mark in year)
  • Western Circuit Advocacy Prize, for best advocacy on BVC
  • Lord Bowen, Walter Wigglesworth and Hardwicke scholarships from Lincoln’s Inn

Lawyer Rankings

London Bar > Planning

(Leading Juniors)Ranked: Tier 3

Cain OrmondroydFrancis Taylor Building

London Bar > Local government (including rating law)

(Leading Juniors)Ranked: Tier 1

Cain OrmondroydFrancis Taylor Building ‘Cain has excellent knowledge of the law, precedent and its application to the subject.’

Francis Taylor Building contains ‘some of the brightest and best barristers in this field’, routinely acting in local government and ratings matters. Richard Glover KC led Cain Ormondroyd in Church of Scientology Religious Education College Inc v Ricketts (VO), a complex appeal in the Upper Tribunal regarding the application of religious rate-exemptions for the Scientology movement’s London sites. Richard Honey KC represented JD Wetherspoon as sole counsel in a settled claim between JD Wetherspoon and Birmingham City Council over compensation for the compulsory acquisition of one of the pub chain’s leaseholds. Hugh Flanagan acted in the test case of Vistra International v Bunyan (VO), a dispute regarding whether Covid-19-related factors affected liability for business rates.