Leigh Day

Firm Details:
Senior Partner: Martyn Day
Managing Partner: Chris Benson
Partners:65
Assistants:90
Number of UK Partners:65
Number of other UK fee-earners:291
(Paralegals & Associates):241 (197 Paralegals & 44 Associates)

Contacts:
Accident & PI: Sally Moore
Abuse: Alison Millar
Administrative: Sean Humber
Clinical Negligence: Suzanne White
Employment & Discrimination: Emma Satyamurti and Nigel Mackay
Environment: Martyn Day
Healthcare: Sean Humber
Human Rights: Jamie Beagent
International Group Claims: Richard Meeran
Product Liability: Boz Michalowska Howells

THE FIRM:
Leigh Day is a top 100 law firm committed to claimant only cases ensuring that individuals have the same access to justice as the UK Government and large corporations.

PRINCIPAL AREAS OF WORK 

Personal Injury:
The team acts for clients who have suffered severe and often life changing injuries. This includes cases of severe orthopaedic fractures, life changing injuries such as limb loss and brain and spinal injuries and representing a very large number of bereaved families. The cycling team handles hundreds of claims every year and is the exclusive provider of legal support to British Cycling and British Triathlon members.

Industrial Disease:
The industrial disease team at Leigh Day not only represent clients who have developed an illness, usually from negligent exposure to asbestos in the workplace, but they has also shaped the law through landmark rulings, including from the Supreme Court, which improve the rights of all negligence victims.

Administrative & Public Law:
The has one of the leading claimant judicial review and public law practices in the country.The firm undertakes a large number of high-profile judicial reviews for charities and civil society organisations including challenges to immigration policy, the roll out of Universal Credit, multiple major infrastructure projects, arms exports, trade policy and failures to prosecute bribery and corruption.The firm also represents individuals seeking to address wrongs in fields ranging from immigration and health and social care to planning law.

Clinical Negligence:
The firm has 30 lawyers representing clients who have been injured, or the families of the deceased, through negligence in a healthcare setting. Head of department Suzanne White is a trustee of the Patients Association and the team works with many other organisations campaigning for patient safety across the NHS and in private practice.

Employment:
The employment team at Leigh Day represents individuals in the most complex and high value claims covering all aspects of employment and discrimination law. It also acts for around 80,000 supermarket workers in some of the largest equal pay group claims in history, as well as bringing claims challenging discriminatory changes to public sector pensions. The team has also pioneered legal challenges against gig economy employers and continues to represent thousands of gig economy workers.

Environment:
The firm specialises in public law challenges to decisions impacting upon the environment as well as tortious claims resulting from exposure to pollution, including radiation, chemicals, pesticides and sewage in the sea.The firm regularly acts in challenges to major infrastructure projects including Heathrow, Bristol and Southampton Airports,major road projects including the Stonehenge and rail projects including HS2.The firm successfully challenged the government’s Net Zero Strategy in 2022. The firm represents Wild Justice, a group led by the naturalist and broadcaster, Chris Packham, frequently litigating to protect wildlife and ecosystem.The firm also represents communities abroad who suffer environmental damage as a result of the acts of UK based companies, including oil spills in the Niger delta and mining in Zambia.

Human Rights:
The human rights department offers specialist expertise in a wide range of human rights and civil liberties issues including:claims against the police, immigration, support for migrants, unlawful detention and false imprisonment, healthcare & social care rights, inquests and bereavement, welfare rights, prisoners’ rights, the abuse of children & vulnerable adults, data rights & confidentiality, planning & the environment. The team has an outstanding reputation for its work in all these areas and has been ground-breaking in its consideration of the impact of human rights on health and social care law.

International:
The firm has pioneered legal developments in multi-party cases on behalf of claimants in the UK and overseas, ensuring that large corporations based in the UK face justice in the UK over the actions of their subsidiaries in developing countries. The firm has also been at the forefront of litigation against the UK Government for alleged human rights breaches arising from the UK’s involvement in overseas military operations and the global ‘war on terror’. In addition, the firm has been at the vanguard of modern slavery litigation. The department’s cases emanate from across globe, in particular Africa, Asia, South America and Europe.Over the past 30 years Leigh Day has provided access to justice to thousands of individuals who would otherwise have gone without redress. The work of the international team has established numerous landmark legal precedents, including Supreme Court authority, on issues as diverse as parent company liability and jurisdiction, the remit of English courts to adjudicate on the UK’s actions overseas, the interplay of UN Security Council Resolutions and the UK’s obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights and the duty of care owed to those serving in the British military abroad. The team’s successes go beyond securing compensation, such as in 2018, obtaining an unprecedented public apology from the UK Government for its role in the ‘detention, rendition and suffering’ of its clients Abdul Hakim Belhaj and Fatima Boudchar.

Product Liability:
The department has been involved in some of the most important product liability cases of the last 25 years. Claims include those against manufacturers of home appliances, medical devices, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and food products. The firm has also acted on behalf of claimants injured in clinical trials. The team are currently acting as the joint-lead lawyers, in the emissions defeat device group litigation against Volkswagen in the UK believed to be the largest group action in the UK, it is also investigating emissions claims against most vehicle manufacturers over diesel emissions on behalf of 100,000 UK drivers.