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Year of Call: 1976
Education: : LLB Hons
Languages: French (Fluent)
Email: michaeljefferis@13oldsquare.com
Areas of practice
Michael is an experienced advocate with a very wide field
of practice.
Michael has been in busy full time practice at the Chancery Bar
for 28 years. His work involves all possible aspects of broad chancery
practice, including company, insolvency, landlord and tenant, (residential
and business), mortgages, guarantees, trusts, capital taxes, conveyancing,
Inheritance Act claims, Probate, Will construction and rectification,
boundary disputes, joint property disputes, professional negligence,
commercial contracts, building disputes and Directors Disqualification.
He also specialises in Town and Country Planning and Local Government
work, including Judicial Review.
Whilst he is very experienced in all these fields, his practice
has developed a particular focus at times. For example, he spent
much of his time from 1992 to 1996 acting for one very well known
client, in a mass of company related matters, and from 1997 to 2001
acting for Lloyd’s Names and groups of Names. He represented
a number of Names in the preliminary stages of the well-known Society
of Lloyd’s v Jaffray trial.
Since then he has developed an international element to his practice
working for a major French shipping line and, through them, other
French clients.
Appointments
- Deputy Adjudicator to HM Land Registry (March 2004)
- Deputy Chancery Master (February 2002)
- Bencher, Lincoln’s Inn (1999)
Reported cases and recent work
Companies and directors disqualification
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Secretary of State for Trade & Industry v T. Venables:
Robert Walker J. in April 1997; Lightman J. in July 1997; Evans-Lombe
J. in January 1998.
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Tottenham Hotspur Plc and others v Edennote Plc [1995] 1 BCLC
65: winding up for untaxed costs; cross claim against Petitioner’s
subsidiary.
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Re Edennote, Tottenham Hotspur Plc v Ryman & Others [1995]
2 BCLC 248, The Times 3rd June 1996, [1996] 2 BCLC 389 (CA):
setting aside transaction by liquidator & replacement of
liquidator.
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Re a Company (No. 003843 of 1986) [1987] BCLC 562, [1987]
BCC 624: oppression of minority shareholders, petition under
section 459 of Companies Act 1985.
General Chancery and Professional Negligence
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Michael has a particular speciality of saving clients tax,
and lawyers from major negligence actions, by means of rectification
of deeds (e.g. Lake v Lake [1989] STC 865) and rectification
by “interpretation” of deeds (Schneider v Mills
[1993] STC 430) .
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Pinfield v Eagles, Mr Justice Hart, 6th April 2005, 2005 WL
756063: claim to interest in company through work in reliance
on understanding.
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Murphy v Burrows [2005] 1 P & CR DG 3: proprietary estoppel;
classic claim based on working for years in reliance on oral
promise, defeated on the basis that it was not unconscionable
in the circumstance not to leave farm to claimant.
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Grimm v Newman & Another [2003] 1 All ER 67: accountants’
duty to give advice as to how to structure a property acquisition
in most fiscally efficient way.
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Hurlingham Estates Ltd v Wilde & Partners [1997] 1 Lloyds
Rep. 525; [1997] STC 627: professional negligence; solicitors’
duty to give tax advice or adequately limit their retainer.
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Crone v Lee Valley Regional Park Authority, Ferris J and Court
of Appeal, 26th June 1989: adverse possession.
Judicial Review
- Evans v Chief Constable of North Wales Police [1982] 1 WLR
1155 HL: breach of rules of natural justice in discretionary decision
making process in dismissing probationary constable.
Land Charges Act 1972
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Perez-Adamson v Perez-Rivas [1987] Fam 89, [1987] 3 All ER
20, [1987] 3 WLR 500 (C.A.): priority of charges, wife’s
lis pendens priority over bank charge.
Lloyd’s litigation
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Society of Lloyd’s v Frazer & Others: appeared (led
by Robin Mathew QC) for a group of Names in the Court of Appeal.
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Society of Lloyd’s v Jaffray: appeared in several applications
before Cresswell J; acted for, and continues to act for, a number
of Names in relation to claims brought by banks and other financial
institutions.
Memberships
Member, Chancery Bar Association
Member, Planning and Environment Bar Association
Member, Professional Negligence Bar Association
Member, Western Circuit.
Former long-standing committee member (twice Chairman) of the Bar
Representation Committee, Lincoln's Inn.
Co-opted member of the Bar Council Working Party on Accountability
in the Bar Council.
Former Borough Councillor and Chairman of Development Services Committee,
Hertsmere Borough Council.
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