Keir joined 7KBW in October 2011 following completion of pupillage in Chambers. He is developing a practice covering all areas of commercial litigation and arbitration, with a particular focus on insurance and reinsurance, shipping, professional negligence, sale of goods and private international law.

He practises both as an advocate and in an advisory role, and is equally comfortable acting on his own or as part of a team of counsel. If you are interested in instructing Keir, please contact our clerks to discuss the requirements of the case and his availability.

BA in Japanese and Asia Pacific Studies (first class, top in year, distinction in spoken Japanese) - University of Leeds, 2006
MA in Japanese Literature (distinction, top in year) - SOAS, 2007
BA in Jurisprudence (first class, 4th in year) - Lincoln College, University of Oxford, 2009
Bar Vocational Course (outstanding) - BPP London, 2010

Scholarships and prizes:

Crabtree Prize (2003, 2005); Japanese Ministry of Education Scholarship (2004); Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society Award (2006); Don Rimmington Prize (2006); Gluckstein Scholarship (2008); Queen Mother Scholarship (2009); Baron Dr Ver Heyden de Lancey Prize (2010).

Languages:

Japanese (both spoken and written)

• Insurance & Reinsurance
• Shipping
• General Commercial Disputes

Selected Cases:

• Currently acting for the excess liability insurers of American gas and electricity companies in relation to claims arising as a result of the California wildfires of 2007. Instructed as junior to Peter MacDonald Eggers QC and Michael Holmes.
• Instructed as junior counsel (led by Gavin Kealey QC) in an LCIA arbitration on preliminary issues concerning the construction of a bankers’ blanket bond policy.
• Advised in various cases involving the Third Parties (Rights Against Insurers) Acts, including the extra-territorial application of the 1930 Act and the transitional provisions in the 2010 Act.
• Assisted as a pupil with drafting closing submissions in an arbitration claim brought by an energy company and its captive insurer in connection with the cracking and severance of a structural brace on a major offshore platform.
• Assisted as a pupil in a number of large scale insurance and reinsurance disputes, involving issues such as coverage and notification defences, aggregation and third party claims.
  

Selected Cases: 

• Instructed as junior counsel to co-ordinate disclosure in a large and technically complex shipbuilding dispute involving issues of cancellation and permissible delay.
• Drafted written closing submissions for the defendant buyers in a shipbuilding arbitration under the LMAA rules.
• Settled pleadings and advised as sole counsel in various shipping matters, including laytime and demurrage disputes, deductions from hire, stevedore damage, the exercise of owners’ lien over cargo, and a claim relating to the use of anti-piracy measures in transit through the Gulf of Aden.
• Advised in relation to jurisdiction and evidential issues in a dispute over the identity of the parties to a charterparty.
• Advised cargo receivers on the wording of a standard form rain letter.
• Assisted as a pupil with a wide range of charterparty disputes, including in respect of an oil majors clause, speed and performance warranty, RightShip warranty, unsafe port claims, an entire agreement clause, and various off-hire claims.
  
  
  

Keir acts in disputes covering the full spectrum of commercial law.  Recent examples include:

• Instructed to undertake document review in a major dispute involving claims of fraud under foreign tax laws.
• Settled amended pleadings and advised on procedural issues in Commercial Court proceedings concerning the proper treatment of exchange rate gains made by an insurance broker.
• Instructed as sole counsel in County Court trials, including a claim on a company director’s personal guarantee of business debts, and a dispute involving the carriage of goods by air under the Montreal Convention.
• Instructed in various County Court matters on behalf of banks.
• Settled pleadings in a sale of goods dispute involving issues of rejection, satisfactory quality and sale by sample.
  
  

Contributor to Mance, Goldrein and Merkin: Insurance Disputes (2011), chapter on jurisdiction and arbitration.