Katherine Eddy
Professional Summary
Called 2009
Contact Details
E Katherine.Eddy@11kbw.com T +44 (0)20 7632 8500 Clerk Lee Cutler Clerk Joe Freeman E Contact Clerks
Katherine practises in employment, public and education law, and is ranked in the legal directories as a leading junior in each of these fields.
She is a member of the Attorney General’s C Panel of Counsel, and is currently acting as one of five barristers carrying out the FA Review into Child Sex Abuse Allegations in Football, led by Clive Sheldon QC.
Katherine came to the UK from Canada on a Commonwealth Scholarship. She has a doctorate in political philosophy from Balliol College, Oxford, and worked as a British Academy Research Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Social Justice in Oxford before joining Chambers.
Specialisms
Employment
Katherine has extensive advocacy experience acting for both claimants and respondents in complex, multi-day discrimination and whistleblowing claims. She has acted for and against large financial institutions, local authorities, government departments, retailers and small charities.
Her recent work includes:
- Samara v MBI & Partners UK Limited [2016] EWHC 441 (QB) (led by Simon Devonshire QC) An appeal against a refusal to set aside default judgment
- Hoodless v Citibank NA (ET, London East) Acting for the Claimant in an unfair dismissal complaint brought by an Fx trader dismissed for breach of the bank’s confidential information policies
- Essex County Council v Jarrett (EAT, 1 May 2015) Acting for the Claimant in an appeal about a Claimant’s disclosure obligations in the context of a remedy hearing
- Samara v MBI & Partners UK Limited [2014] EWHC 4220 (QB) Sole counsel for the Claimant in four day High Court trial (about an employment contract alleged, but found not, to have been fraudulent)
Education
Katherine has a busy education law practice. Her clients in the education field include universities, local authorities, government departments, independent schools, students and parents.
She appears regularly in the First-tier Tribunal and the Upper Tribunal, and advises on the full range of education law matters. She has particular experience in matters relating to academies.
Her recent work includes:
- Advising on the termination of an academy’s funding agreement
- Acting for the Claimant in a judicial review challenge about the lawfulness of the use of a certificate of catholic practice in a school’s admissions criteria
- Advising on a discrimination claim concerning the appointment of a head teacher to a faith school
- Advising a nursery on a challenge to the contents of an Ofsted inspection report
- Acting for a school in a transgender discrimination claim
- Acting for a school in an appeal against a First-Tier Tribunal’s disability discrimination judgment
Public
Katherine advises on human rights, local government powers and duties, and has particular experience in the overlap between education and public law.
Her recent work includes:
- A and B v Secretary of State for Health [2015] UKSC 220 (led by Jason Coppel QC) – a case concerning whether the NHS in England was obliged to fund abortion services for women resident in Northern Ireland
- The FA Review into Child Sex Abuse Allegations in Football (led by Clive Sheldon QC)
- Acting for a local authority in a judicial review claim for accommodation and support brought in reliance on
- Article 4 ECHR and the Anti-Trafficking Directive
- Acting for a regulatory body in a judicial review challenge to the lawfulness of their complaints procedure
- Advising on a proposed claim for judicial review of an interim care plan
Recommendations
Chambers & Partners and Legal 500:
“She is incisive, confident, and intellectually and tactically sound”
“She puts the client at ease and inspires confidence in everything she does”
“Not a single weakness to be found”
“A class act; a brilliant mind, a clear thinker and very accommodating”
“An excellent junior”
“A phenomenal advocate who is very assured and instils confidence”
“An acute analyst with a really sure grasp of public law principles”
“Very sensible and commercial, she always displays good judgment”
“She is very good on the law and has a clear and direct advocacy style which is very persuasive”
News, Articles & Publications
- Against Ideal Rights’ in Social Theory and Practice 2008 34 (3): 463-481
- ‘Welfare Rights as Equality Rights? Insights from the Supreme Court of Canada’ in S. Tierney (ed) Multiculturalism and the Canadian Constitution (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007)
- ‘On Revaluing the Currency of Human Rights’ in Politics Philosophy and Economics 2007 6: 307-328
- ‘Welfare Rights and Conflicts of Rights’ in Res Publica 2006 12: 337-356
