About

After Stowe and then reading Spanish and French at Oxford, I spent three years as a Lloyd’s reinsurance broker, first at Golding Stewart Wrightson (which became part of Willis) and later at Greig Fester (which became part of Benfields, which became part of AON). I left the market to qualify as a barrister, and after a brief stint at Lloyd’s Solicitors Department, switched to the other side of the profession, re-qualifying as a solicitor in 1992.

For over 10 years, from 1996 to 2006, I was Head of Reinsurance at Elborne Mitchell, specialising in complex reinsurance disputes, energy claims and general liability issues. I am now with the London office of Sedgwick Detert Moran & Arnold LLP.

I am a member of BILA, the Society for Computers & Law, the International Bar Association and also maintain this site, which aims to be a rolling and relatively informal round-up of news and commentary about risk and the London insurance and reinsurance market.

I speak frequently at industry conferences, both in the UK and overseas, and am recognized and recommended as a Leading Individual in the Insurance & Reinsurance field by the Legal 500.

Experience

Some highlights include

• Ecuadorian oil pipeline dispute: advising and acting for a leading Ecuadorian insurer in relation to a very significant dispute with reinsurers over an underlying claim for Delay in Start-Up
• Ship management claim: advising a major Lloyd’s broker in relation to a claim against it arising out of the liability of a shipping managing agent to pay premium to a P&I Club
• Various Bermuda Form disputes: acting for and advising major Bermudian carriers regarding claims brought against them by (mainly) US insureds in contravention of the provisions of the Bermuda Form as to jurisdiction and forum
• Northern Rock: advising leading UK insurer in relation to a judicial review of the Government’s actions over Northern Rock
• Legacy A&H: acting for US-based carrier in a dispute with retrocessionaires in London over non-payment of significant sums due in relation to a book of A&H business.
• Judicial review of insurance monopoly: advising and acting for the open market in the judicial review of a scheme to monopolise local authority insurance in London into an exclusive mutual carrier.
• Korean product liability: acting on behalf of London Market reinsurers in a product liability dispute in Korea involving defective semi-conductors.
• Life run-off: advising and representing one of the UK’s largest carriers in a dispute by a Continental reinsurer over the run-off of a book of life business.
• Advising brokers: acting for Lloyd’s brokers in relation to funding issues, recouping of brokerage owed, regulatory issues, disclosure obligations etc.
• Energy project in Mexico: acting for leading US carrier in a dispute with London reinsurers arising from defects in the world’s largest nitrogen-producing plant, in Mexico
• A&H/Unicover: representing the brokers central to the Unicover workers comp carve-out saga
• Energy whole account issues: acting for US company in major energy reinsurance dispute with reinsurers concerning a whole account treaty
• Catastrophic French fire: representing London umbrella layer liability insurers in a multi-national, multi-jurisdictional dispute over a large fire loss in France
• Mexican pipeline dispute: advising London excess insurers in relation to major Mexican oil spill
• Acting for Bolivian insurers in a multi-jurisdiction dispute with London-based carriers and brokers, also involving brokers in Argentina
• Facultative disputes in Mexico: advising and acting for London reinsurers in relation to various large Mexican property and liability (inc product liability) losses
• Danish cat: representing London and worldwide reinsurers in major Danish windstorm dispute
• Lloyd’s Names dispute: representing leading London broking house in reinsurance action over recovery of Names PSL losses
• Ecuadorean dam: acting for major German reinsurer in claim involving a dam breach in Ecuador
• Argentina: advising London reinsurers in relation to Argentinean toll-road claims
• advising Chinese conglomerate in relation to contractual disputes with Italian entity
• Libel: various disputes for London companies
• advising and representing leading UK biotech company in dispute with rivals over IP rights
• advising and representing specialist media companies in disputes with major telecoms provider
• a multitude of professional negligence cases – architects, surveyors, solicitors, accountants, auditors, QSs, brokers, IFAs, patent agents, barristers and M&E consultants.

Reported cases

This is not an infallible guide to what I’ve done over the years since approximately 80% of the cases I am involved with are subject to arbitration (a substantial topic in its own right) and thus not reported. The published cases include:

• Hassneh -v- Mew [1993] 2 L1R 493
• AXA -v- Swire Fraser [1999]
• Avon -v- Swire Fraser [2000] 1 Commercial Cases All ER 573
• Hiscox Underwriting v Dickson Manchester & Co Limited [2004] EWHC 479 (Comm)) (NB. though the decision was expressly disapproved by the Court of Appeal less than a year later – see esp. para. 45)
• RMP -v- Brent LBC, both on ultra vires and on breach of the Public Contracts Regulations 2006. UPDATE, 9 June 2009: and now we have won before the Court of Appeal.

Likes

Lovely wife (also a lawyer) and two beautiful daughters, catching & (long-distance) releasing trout on mostly cane rods, my Burmese cats, photography, motorbikes, bicycles, travelling to slightly out-of-the-way places (inc. Syria, Iran, Burma, Laos and Libya), tinkering on the flamenco guitar, forgetting how to do Tai Chi.

E-mail: jolyonpatten [at] gmail [dot] com