Arthur Graham-Dixon

Arthur has experience in a wide range of domestic and international work, from UK PFI contracts and cladding disputes to state-investor concession agreements and international energy disputes, covering a variety of legal issues such as conflict of laws and limitation. Recent examples of work include:

• Currently being led by Chantal-Aimée Doerries QC, Head of Atkin Chambers in a £20m dispute concerning a UK abattoir.
• Drafted particulars of claim with Rupert Choat of Atkin Chambers in a multi-million pound dispute arising out of the delayed construction of a care home.
• As sole counsel, drafted defence and counterclaim and reply, and currently acting, in a final account dispute relating to the construction of a boutique jewellery shop.
• As sole counsel, drafted defence and counterclaim together with RFI in a defects dispute between a residential homeowner and a contractor.
• As sole counsel, drafted consent order and settled proceedings against a litigant-in-person at a case management conference in a residential defect dispute.
• As sole counsel, appeared in an application for a preliminary issue hearing in a residential defect dispute.
• As sole counsel, appeared in case management conference dealing with (inter alia) costs budgeting in a residential defects dispute.
• Advised on contractual termination and claims for delayed completion under an agreement for sale of a property.
• Advised on Final Statement conclusivity provisions in the JCT Design and Build Contract 2011.
• Advised on remuneration provisions in an architect’s contract.
• Advised on a payment dispute between a residential homeowner and a contractor.

• Part of a team of counsel drafting the response to a defence and counterclaim valued at over US$2 billion. Individually responsible for producing the first draft of the response to a section spanning several hundred pages with a value in excess of several hundred million dollars.

• As sole counsel, drafted defence and contribution notice, and currently acting, in £800,000 multi-party High Court claim concerning sale of property, defects and architects’ certificates.
• Advised on a professional negligence claim concerning an architect’s supervisory work.

• As sole counsel, settled particulars of claim and reply, and currently acting, in £175,000 claim on behalf of a recruitment company.
• Advised on expert determination clause and other related issues arising out of a property sale agreement.
• Advised on Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998.

Arthur’s experience covers issues of jurisdiction (including nomination process), breaches of natural justice, the meaning of construction operations in s. 105 of the HGCRA 1996, hybrid contracts, non-compliance of contracts with s. 108 of the HGCRA 1996, and serial adjudication. Recent examples of work include:

• Sole counsel in Meadowside Building Developments Ltd (in liquidation) v 12-18 Hill Street Management Company Ltd [2019] EWHC 2651 (TCC), the leading case interpreting the Court of Appeal’s decision in Bresco v Lonsdale. Arthur succeeded on behalf of the defendant in resisting an adjudication enforcement on the unprecedented ground that the claimant’s funding arrangement was champertous and so gave rise to a question of abuse of process which could not be determined summarily.
• Sole counsel in Indigo Projects London Ltd v Razin & Anor [2019] EWHC 1205 (TCC), the first case interpreting the Court of Appeal’s decision in Bresco v Lonsdale, in which the enforcing claimant was under a company voluntary arrangement (CVA).
• Sole counsel in Fresh Lime Construction Ltd v Seymour Realty Ltd [2020] 6 WLUK 47, successfully obtaining summary judgment in the TCC on an assigned claim to enforce an adjudication decision, against a Defendant outside the jurisdiction, having advised on the application to substitute the assignee as claimant, and obtaining indemnity costs of the whole proceedings.
• As sole counsel, successfully enforced an adjudication decision in the Technology and Construction Court and obtained indemnity costs against the resisting party.
• As sole counsel, made a non-party costs order application against the director to a company resisting adjudication enforcement proceedings.
• Drafted court documents required to issue an adjudication enforcement action.

Fresh Lime Construction Ltd v Seymour Realty Ltd [2020] 6 WLUK 47

Meadowside Building Developments Ltd (in liquidation) v 12-18 Hill Street Management Company Ltd [2019] EWHC 2651 (TCC); (2019) 186 Con. L.R. 148

Indigo Projects London Ltd v Razin & Anor [2019] EWHC 1205 (TCC); [2019] Bus. L.R. 1957; [2019] B.L.R. 454; (2019) 184 Con. L.R. 251; [2019] B.P.I.R. 861

2016-2017 

BPTC, City Law School

Lord Mansfield Scholar, Lincoln’s Inn

Hardwicke Scholar, Lincoln’s Inn

BPTC Scholarship, City Law School

2015-2016

GDL, City Law School

Contract Law coursework prize, City Law School (an essay on penalty clauses)

GDL moot final (Supreme Court before Lord Mance)

Appeared on behalf of the parents of an excluded child in the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal (part of the First Tier Tribunal), through the School Exclusion Project

Member of City Law School team the Vis Moot (the leading international arbitration moot)

2011-2015

BA in Classics (Literae Humaniores 1A), University of Oxford, Double First (7^th in university)

Hugh Oldham Scholar, Corpus Christi, Oxford

Three Isaiah Berlin prizes, Corpus Christi, Oxford

Arthur is a contributing editor of the new Hudson’s Building and Engineering Contracts (14th ed., 2020).

Arthur is a member of TECBAR, COMBAR and the Society of Construction Law.