Practice Profile

• Public Law
• Planning and Environmental Law
• Local Government Law - Community Care, Housing, Health and Safety
• Immigration and Asylum
• Compulsory Purchase
• Education Law

Sarah is developing a broad public law practice and is regularly instructed to appear in a range of courts and tribunals including the Court of Appeals, the High Court, public inquiries and the criminal courts.

Sarah joined Francis Taylor Building in October 2009 following the successful completion of her pupillage. She practices across the range of Chambers' specialisms with a particular focus on administrative law, planning and environmental law, education and local government law.

She completed a secondment with the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea where she undertook a range of drafting, advisory and advocacy work. Sarah will be on sabbatical for a year from summer of 2010. She will be undertaking an LLM at Harvard Law School where she holds the Frank Knox Memorial Fellowship. .

Notable recent cases:

• R (oao Rafaela Savva) v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea [2010] EWHC 414 (Admin) (appeared alone in the High Court. Being lead by Nathalie Lieven QC in the Court of Appeal)
• Vivienne Morge v Hampshire County Council [2009] EWHC 2940 (Admin) (decision of Court of Appeal forthcoming) (appeared as junior to Charles George)
• Warikhell v Secretary of State for the Home Department (AIT AA/14538/2009)
• Acted for Thamesbank and Environmental Law Foundation in consultation and examination in public of the Mayor of London's forthcoming London Plan.

Sarah is happy to consider pro bono and legal aid instruction.

Public Law and Human Rights

Sarah is interested in public law, particularly in environmental and welfare law (community care, mental health and social security). She has appeared alone and as a junior in judicial review proceedings in both the High Court and Court of Appeal as well as in the Social Security and the Asylum and Immigration tribunals.

Sarah has a growing practice in community care law. She appeared in R (oao Rafaela Savva) v Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea [2010] EWHC 414 (Admin) the leading case on the calculation of personal budgets in social care which is listed in the Court of Appeal. She has also advised on human rights claims in the context of community care and how they relate to immigration law.

During pupillage, Sarah worked on cases involving changes to electoral boundaries, environmental impact assessment, the application of Article 8 ECHR in compulsory purchase cases.

Sarah teaches Public Law and Human Rights at Queen Mary, University of London and has published articles in the field. She was previously a Teaching Fellow in Constitutional and Administrative Law at City University (2007-8).

Planning and Environmental

Sarah's practice in planning and environmental law encompasses planning and enforcement inquiries as well as High Court work. Sarah works on cases with a European law dimension and has advised on the application of the EIA, SEA and Habitats Directives and in relation to waste and contaminated land. 

Sarah appeared as junior to Charles George QC in Vivienne Morge v Hampshire County Council [2009] EWHC 2940 (Admin) a judicial review challenge to the Council's decision to grant permission for a busway in the absence of an EIA and alleged failures under the Habitats Directive. The decision of the Court of Appeal is forthcoming.

Sarah works with a number of environmental organisations and community action groups. She is a referral member for the Environmental Law Foundation. She has acted for the Thamesbank group on the Public Examination of the Mayor of London's Plan and was instructed on behalf of the Chelsea Barracks Action Group in opposing Richard Rogers' residential scheme.

She is also familiar with the law on Town and Village Greens. She was instructed by the Kent University Law Clinic to act for local residents in a week long inquiry to register commons land in Canterbury.

Sarah lectures and writes regularly on environmental law issues.

Education

In the education law field, Sarah works on cases dealing with Special Educational Needs and Higher Education. She is instructed with Gregory Jones in Maxwell v OIA, a judicial review concerning disability discrimination claims before the Office of the Independent Adjudicator.

Other experience

Sarah volunteers at Toynbee Hall (Free Legal Advice Centre) where she advises on housing, social security, debt and immigration law.

Before commencing pupillage Sarah was an Inner Temple Scholar at the Supreme Court of Israel, Jerusalem. She worked as Foreign Law Clerk for Justice Hanan Melcer, advising on Human Rights and Administrative Law.

Qualifications and Fellowships

• Call to Bar: 2008 (Inner Temple)
• LLM, Harvard Law School (commencing in September 2010); Frank Know Memorial Fellowship
• CPE Diploma in Law, City University (Distinction); Inner Temple Major Scholarship and City University Prize
• BA History, Queens' College, Cambridge, (First Class)
• Professional Organisations: Administrative Law Bar Association (ALBA), Human Rights Law Association (HRLA)
• Languages: Spanish (fluent)

Publications

• "Debating Democracy and the Ban on Political Advertising", Modern Law Review, 475-487 (May, 2009)
• "Waste Law" with Gregory Jones, Environmental Law and Property Transactions, Waite eds. Tottels 3^rd ed, 2009
• "Planning Law Update", with Gregory Jones, Solicitors Journal, December 2008 and September 2009
• Assisted Lord Steyn in the preparation of the Boydell Lecture on "Defamation and Privacy" (26 May 2010)