CONSULTANCY and TRAINING
The consultancy services I offer consist of legal advisory work and training.
Advisory work
I advise in all areas of international law and practice relating to the environmental aspects of shipping. These include various elements of the subject which affect maritime commerce under contracts governed by English law.
Most of my work has been for clients in the shipping, oil and insurance industries, particularly P&I Clubs and other marine liability insurers, in relation to pollution from ships and other marine environmental problems.
I act as adviser to shipping and insurance bodies on the legal aspects of maritime policy in environmental affairs, but most of my work involves assisting insurance clients in responding to maritime casualties which affect, or may affect, the environment. Fortunately major oil spills now occur less often than in the past, but most cases involving even modest pollution are potentially serious. Given the range of challenges normally involved, including legal aspects with both national and international elements, an effective response typically calls for cooperation among professional teams, including lawyers and experts both in the UK and overseas. I am not in competition with law firms, notably those with shipboard casualty investigation skills outside my competence, but I do offer specialist input from one of the few people whose work has been almost entirely in this field. I have now acted in over sixty incidents of this kind, many of them headline cases.
Specific areas in which I have worked and offer advice include all those listed in the side-bar menu. My experience in each of them is summarised in my Personal profile.
Terms of business and charges
My normal terms of business are similar to those of other legal professionals, whilst differing in certain respects as I no longer practise as a solicitor.
Unless some other arrangement is agreed my charges for consultancy work (other than training and education) are based on an hourly rate. The current rate and TOB are widely agreed among clients in the shipping and insurance industries, including the great majority of P&I Clubs in the International Group.
For further details please see Colin de la Rue Terms of Business or feel free to get in touch (see contact details below).
I provide in-house training in various areas of law and practice concerned with environmental aspects of shipping.
Few areas of maritime law are less easily understood in isolation from their practical setting. I offer long experience both in professional practice and in teaching and writing on these subjects.
Most of the training I provide is designed for legal, claims and underwriting executives in P&I Clubs, and usually it involves a combination of talks and workshops. These are practical exercises in routine responses to incidents as well as in recognising the more challenging issues. They are also structured to facilitate transfer of in-house know-how from more experienced executives to their younger colleagues.
This has proved a popular formula – in the four years to the end of 2018 I had provided ten of the thirteen International Group Clubs with a total of 78 talks and 22 workshops. More are in the diary, and new products are in preparation along similar lines.
Please see Training Options for further details of the sessions I offer and the cost involved.
Tel. (office): 44 (0) 1394 549 034
Tel. (mobile): 44 (0) 7887 503 816