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Back to People

Paul Donnelly

Partner, Birmingham

Paul handles a broad range of (injury and non-injury) claims and coverage matters, under Employer's, Public and Products Liability, Professional/ Officials Indemnity and CAR insurance policies, together with other commercial claims.
T: +44 (0)121 200 0439
M: +44 (0)7798 700459
E:

Experience

Paul leads DWF's Casualty team in Birmingham and our Abuse Claims Special Interest Group. Paul has a particular interest in complex liability issues and niche areas of law, such as vicarious liability, failure to remove and modern slavery, as well as "damage" in the context of construction and product liability policies. 

Paul has many years' experience of acting for major international and UK insurers, large corporates and public bodies, in a range of complex and often specialist, highly sensitive cases, some of which cross international borders.  

His caseload involves defending claims and advising on policy coverage issues, across matters including property damage, product liability claims, construction and engineering claims, as well as high value/complex injury claims including relating to abuse.

Paul advises on jurisdiction issues/disputes, including in multi-defendant (often products) cases and personal injury claims; also on how his clients may recover their related costs.  This includes a leading case in which, following success in the jurisdiction battle, Paul obtained a wasted costs order against the Claimants' solicitors to recover the client's incurred legal costs. Paul has pursued other innovative means of seeking cost recovery, such as assigning a litigants cause of action to pursue former solicitors for their negligent advice as part of a discontinuance.

Paul has been involved in several leading law-making cases, particularly dealing with issues such as abuse, failure to remove and vicarious liability. He has extensive experience advising on incidents of the utmost severity and sensitivity. He is well versed in advising on media/PR issues. His advice and assistance is sought by local authority/public body and private sector clients in relation to the death of children. He has acted in several of the most high profile child death cases of the last 15 years. 

As an acknowledged expert in claims relating to abuse, Paul sits as an expert on the Forum of Insurance Lawyer's Abuse Sector Focus Team. He is also the legal advisor to the Safeguarding Subcommittee of the Roman Catholic Church Birmingham Archdiocesan Trust.

Paul is the Global Client Partner for one of DWF's global key clients, which involves him managing and co-ordinating matters relating to the relationship, with colleagues and client teams across the world.

Paul has been recommended in successive editions of the major legal directories in the Professional Negligence (Defendant); Personal Injury (Defendant); and Local Government categories.

Testimonials

Paul has been described in testimonials given to the legal directories as:

“[having] a very good acuity for how cases are going to pan out and how to fight them”

"one of the best defence solicitors operating in this field"

"provides excellent tactical and legal knowledge, and is prepared to fight legally novel cases very hard"

"extremely capable, well organised and affable. He is a strategic and tenacious negotiator. He brings clear minded common sense to each claim. He has excellent communication skills, with a proven track record in complex PI claims"

 Chambers & Partners 

"technically excellent… a stand-out…."

" Very responsive. He's tenacious and a real fighter. He offers a really thoughtful analysis of cases, with a keen eye for tactics. He engages with the issues in a much deeper way that most of the solicitors I work with in this area. He's also very personable…"

"one of the most tactically astute and intelligent solicitors I have met" 

Legal 500

Related Sectors

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Cases

Notable reported cases
  • BAI (Run off) and others v Durham & others v [2012] UKSC 14 – Part of the team instructed by Zurich Insurance and successful in the UK Supreme Court in the ground breaking coverage case known as the EL Policy Trigger Litigation.
  • Costain Ltd v Tarmac Holdings Ltd [2017] EWHC 319 TCC– acted for the successful defendant and its Product Guarantee insurers in a construction materials products claim. The case involved European regulatory law in connection with CE marking, adjudication proceedings and an application to stay the claim to give effect to an ADR agreement. It was the first case to consider the interpretation and application of the "mutual trust and cooperation" obligation in the NEC3 suite of contracts
  • Wilde v Coventry City Council [2017] 3 WLUK 750 208 – defence of a historic abuse claim at a limitation trial.
  • Jovicic & Others v The Serbian Orthodox Church – Serbian Patriarchy v Kesar & Co [2020] EWHC 2229 (QB) ; [2021] PNLR 3 –  Acted for the Patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church following allegations against clergy of abuse and murder in Bosnia, Serbia and Croatia, including during the Bosnian war. The case produced 3 reported judgments with the English court refusing to exercise jurisdiction and the Defendant obtaining a wasted costs order for the full amount of its costs after several unsuccessful attempts by the Claimants to appeal decisions. The case was the subject of an Al-Jazeera Balkans documentary.
  • DFX & Others v Coventry City Council [2021] EWHC 1382 (QB) – Acted for the successful defendant and Officials Indemnity insurers in what was described in open court as the largest failure to remove claim ever pleaded (£40m+). This was the first trial of such a claim to consider the circumstances in which a local authority does/does not owe a duty of care to children to apply for a Care Order under s.31 of the Children Act 1989 to remove them from their parents' care ("failure to remove").
  • AB v Worcestershire County Council & Anor [2022] EWHC 115 (QB); [2023] EWCA Civ 529 – successful at first instance and in the Court of Appeal in the first summary judgment application in which the court addressed the legal test for failure to remove claims brought under the Human Rights. The Claimant's application for permission to appeal to the UK Supreme Court was rejected.
  • MXX v A Secondary School [2022] EWHC 2207 (QB); [2023] EWCA Civ 996 – successful defence at trial and in the Court of Appeal of a vicarious liability claim. Insufficient connection between the relationship between a school and a work experience pupil/teacher and his grooming and abuse of a pupil to give rise to vicarious liability. The Claimant's application for permission to appeal to the UK Supreme Court was rejected.
  • JXH v The Vicar, Parochial Church Council and Churchwardens of Holcombe Rogus [2023] EWHC 3221 (KB) – successful defence of a vicarious liability claim examining the authorised activities of a parish vicar and determined insufficient connection between his assaults on young men part of an alleged "monastic community" in the parish and his role as the parish vicar to give rise to vicarious liability.
Other recent / ongoing cases
  • Acting for a corporate client which was subject to a cyber-attack leading to a mass cyber claims group action involving several thousand claimants.
  • Acting in series of claims arising out of an international human trafficking ring.
  • Acting for 3 different local authorities in 5 unconnected, high profile and widely reported, cases involving the murder of children by those charged with their care. Separately, Paul also acted for a local authority and its insurers following an incident widely reported across the national media which involved the accidental death of several children.
  • Successful defence of a multi-million pound product liability claim relating to the supply chain in the pigment industry, achieving discontinuance a matter of weeks pre-trial.
  • Acting for insurers in a number of multi million pound product liability and property damage claims including an eight figure claim following a fire at a warehouse distribution centre.
  • Acting in a series of (collectively eight figure) claims relating to supply of defective concrete and asphalt.
  • Acted for a firm of accountants in connection with a €55m fraud perpetrated in connection with off plan property investments.
  • Acting for corporate clients and their insurers in catastrophic injury claims involving amputations, paraplegia and traumatic brain injury.
  • Acting for a gas distribution network operator in a series of gas explosion claims involving catastrophic property damage and personal injury (inc. fatalities).
  • Acting for a local authority and its Public Liability insurers in an alleged eight-figure claim following alleged brain injury to a small child.
  • Acting for a multinational ecommerce company and its insurers in a product liability claim involving catastrophic brain injury to a small child.
  • Acting for a local authority and its Public Liability insurers in a group of claims arising out of crowd control issues at a concert.
  • Acting in several groups of abuse claims (first party coverage and advising on/acting in the third party claims), two of which arose from separate (unconnected) BBC Panorama investigations/programmes.