Donald McCue

Don has a very wide range of practice experience. Initially his case-load was divided equally between civil litigation, family division work and criminal cases, in all levels of court from Magistrates Courts to the Court of Appeal. From the early 1980’s he was primarily a family division specialist until joining his present chambers in 1988. Since then commercial work has predominated. He conducts contract litigation of all types as well as partnership actions, professional negligence litigation, and disputes about beneficial interests in property between former cohabitees. 

His contact over many years with clients from all walks of life in cases of all kinds (some of them extremely harrowing) has endowed him with enormous experience and  skill in dealing with people, and he is known to be calm and authoritative with clients however pressured the situation becomes.

He was one of the first barristers to engage in Public Access work, where the client briefs the barrister direct with no solicitor involved. Client skills are at a premium in this arena.

Mediation

He has appeared as counsel in numerous mediations and qualified as a mediator in 2004.

In Don’s experience, a mediator needs to have a thorough grasp of the factual and legal issues involved in the dispute, so as to be able to form an authoritative view of the legal merits. But mediation is a process of assisted negotiation, not the imposition of the mediator’s view. The mediator’s job is to facilitate, on the basis of ground-rules agreed by the parties, a process of negotiating in which the parties to communicate, explore options, and reach an agreement based upon where their best interests lie. Of course a party needs a clear appreciation of the strength or otherwise of his legal position, but that is only one component of his best interests and only one of the levels on which the mediator engages with the parties.