David joined the firm as Partner in the Dispute Resolution Department in Birmingham.
David acts for large corporate clients (PLC’s and major owner managed businesses) and high net worth individuals. He gives individual, practical advice by collaborating closely with his clients and getting to know their business.
When his company subscribed to the Legal 500, David was a Recommended Lawyer in the practice areas of general commercial litigation, intellectual property, and contentious probate.
David’s “former firm, “is very well regarded for commercial litigation.” David Whiting, described as an “excellent strategic litigator” heads up the Dispute Resolution Team.”
Whilst at this firm David guided his department up one tier in the regional Legal 500 rankings.
He specialises in abroad spectrum of commercial disputes, including:-
- commercial contract disputes
- director/shareholder/partner disputes;
- negligence claims, especially professional negligence;
- emergency pre-emptive remedies, obtaining and defending applications for injunctive relief, often (if applying to the court) without notice to the defendant including worldwide freezing orders and pre-action disclosure;
- contentious insolvency; statutory demands; debt recovery; and
- all enforcement proceedings.
Recent Work
- Defending an overseas corporation served with a worldwide freezing order and legal proceedings claiming: $650,000,000;
- Acting for an internationally renowned DJ and others in defending a passing off action (in IPEC) brought by a claimant producing an international music festival in Barcelona seeking to stop the production of an international music festival in Greece;
- Representing and appearing in court on behalf of a payroll manager and her employer, a national security company, to show cause why orders for a substantial fine levied upon the company and /or imprisonment of the employee should not be made;
- Advising a global security company in two major disputes: (1) on the consequences to the client of the termination of a £70,000,000 contract for security services with a leading (and David’s favourite) supermarket in the UK; and (2) on the consequences of the termination of a security services contract with an international security company
- Acting for Europe’s leading distributor of paper and other commodities in a dispute claiming consequential losses arising from a broken print press;
- Advising a company providing services for the joining of cables to the wind turbines of a Scottish utilities company; and advising the company’s insurers as to whether the company’s claim for the costs of its defence was covered under a Management Liability Policy.
- Advising a company owning a beautiful Cotswolds hotel set in many acres of land, supplying wedding services to high-net-worth individuals during lockdown; and considering the guidance of the Competition & Markets Authority;
- Advising a global company manufacturing commercial and domestic spray washing systems upon misrepresentation and breach of a marketing contract for the provision of services at Fan Zones in Nigeria and Tunisia during the football World Cup in 2018;
- Assisting the life partner and fiancé of a notorious criminal in her action against the Metropolitan Police to recover half of the business assets and her personal assets wrongly seized by them;
- Acting for a retired couple in their appeal against an assessment of tax by HMRC in the Upper Tier Tax Tribunal; issuing protective judicial review proceedings; and acting in subsequent professional negligence proceedings against financial advisors;
- Advising a company supplying component parts to F1 Teams in an action for breach of contract for the supply of a £2,000,000 component testing rig.
- Advising Geneva based trustees in defending a £20,000,000 claim for a breach of trust; and
- Advising the life tenant of a trust with offshore assets to secure a £3,850,000 re-float of the trust following the settlement of a breach of trust claim against Geneva based trustees.
Reported Cases
- J S Bloor (Measham) Limited – v – Mr E M Calcott, The Times December 2000-established that conduct could defeat a statutory tenancy by way of proprietary estoppel;
- First National Bank -v- Achampong [2003] EWCA civ 487-O’Brien principles and Etridge Guidelines: Bank was on notice of undue influence even though undue influence exercised by surety on co-surety; and
- Innovation Event Management Limited-v-Unity in the Sun Limited and others [2019] EWHC 2138 (IPEC) the words, “in the sun” were descriptive and generic so the claimant could not claim any goodwill in them.
Qualifications & Memberships
Solicitor of the Senior Courts of England & Wales.
The Law Society of England & Wales.
Outside Interests
David enjoys most sports. He is a lifelong suffering Leeds United fan and an enthusiastic golfer.
He enjoys travelling, walking his daughter’s dog, watching films and TV dramas.