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Andrew McAdam
special counsel, litigation and dispute resolution
meet Andrewabout Andrew
For Andrew McAdam, technical skills are everything. His career, spanning close to 40 years, has been built on a combination of strong analytical and advocacy skills and an ability to really understand and talk to his clients.
After beginning his legal journey with an inclination towards social justice, he went on to fine tune his technical skills in the area of professional indemnity insurance. Later Andrew succeeded in applying his commerciality to building his own practice, which received substantial recognition as a leading law firm in Insurance Law.
“Common sense is the key to providing strategies for clients that are commercial and cost effective at the same time.”
Today Andrew combines his practical approach and technical expertise to service a loyal following of clients and referrers, the majority of whom are from the professional services industry, and more specifically the engineering profession and their insurers. Andrew is sought out for professional negligence claims, as well as insurance law, trade practices, corporations’ law and risk management issues. In all, he achieves great results for his clients.
Areas of Expertise
- Arbitration
- ASX and shareholder disputes
- Building and construction disputes
- Corporations act
- Directors’ duties
- Disputes between directors
- Insolvency, bankruptcy and reconstruction
- Insurance
- Managed investment schemes
- Misleading and deceptive conduct
- Property/leasing disputes
- Professional negligence
- Risk management and planning
- Shareholder claims
- Trade practices
industries
recent experience
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collapse of hih insurance
The principal consulting actuary was one of many caught up in a regulatory investigations and litigation, arising from the collapse of the insurance group. He and his insurers were also faced with a massive damages exposure in litigation in the NSW Supreme Court. Andrew’s thorough forensic investigation and ability to marshal the enormous amounts of information involved resulted in a successful navigation through the investigation and a great commercial outcome for the actuary and his insurers in the litigation.
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lorne and apollo bay waste water treatment plants
The civil works design and construction contractor was sued along with others for alleged claims of civil design defects. In a multi-party litigation, Andrew was successful in preparing a case, that at trial, resulted in the contractor passing the whole of its liability exposure down to the engineering consultants. This resulted in the contractor and its insurers avoiding a financial contribution to the award of damages made to the owners of the plant.
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hobart multi-storey hotel complex
In the building of a multi-storey hotel complex, a dispute over supplied building materials and other contractual issues arose between a building contractor and project principal. Proposing a strategy that involved a materials testing process, Andrew was able to show that the principal was in default under the contract. This dispute was also the subject of an arbitration, resulting in a favourable outcome for the contractor.
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proportionate liability cases
Andrew has been very involved in recent years in cases concerning the development of the law in connection with proportionate liability, which was introduced in Australia in 2004. Andrew was directly involved in advising clients about the meaning and effect of the relevant legislation, formulating a strategy in response to the legislation, and in preparing written submissions for use in court. The cases that Andrew has been involved in include: Dartberg Pty Ltd v Wealthcare Financial Planning Pty Ltd [2007] FCA 1216; Atkins v Interprac Financial Planning Pty Ltd & Anor [2007] VSC 445; Wealthcare Financial Planning Pty Ltd v Financial Industry Complaints Service Ltd & Ors [2009] VSC; 7 Lion-Dairy & Drinks Pty Limited v Jacobs Group (Australia) Pty Ltd (No 5) [2014] FCA 897; COI Building Group Pty Ltd v 100 Percent Plumbing Ltd [2017] VSC 418.
