Simon Sugar

Practice Overview

• Family Finance & Property

  Recent cases of interest include:

  P v Q (Financial Remedies) [2022] EWFC B9 (10 February 2022) 

  Mansfield v Mansfield [2017] Court of Appeal case involving a large fruit farm.

  Landsberg (practising as Barnet Family Law) v Minkin [2015] EWCA Civ 152. Professional negligence claim in respect of drafting consent order.

  Advising Bermudan lawyers on a huge money ancillary relief case involving complex offshore trusts;

  Advising and representing a wife in a 5 day final hearing in which the husband was found to have sent large sums of money out of the jurisdiction and which resulted in a costs order of £100,000 in favour of the wife;

  Advising and representing an unmarried father of unplanned child in a heavily contested case for financial provision under Schedule 1;

  Advising and representing the son of deceased iconic UK celebrity in a case where the wife was seeking to attack the family trusts as a resource of her husband;

  Advising on terms of settlement reached in a case involving one of the wealthiest families in the UK;

  Advising and representing a former minister of state of an African country in ancillary relief proceedings;

  Acting for the Official Solicitor for a patient with Huntingdon’s Disease;

  Advising and representing a senior police officer in a case dominated by his £1.7 million pension;

  Acting as an expert witness on English law in proceedings in British Columbia;

  Advising and representing CEOs of FTSE listed companies in financial remedy proceedings where significant issues arose in respect of complex share option schemes.

  Prior to specialising exclusively in family law, Simon had a mixed practice which included advising in the Dorothea Allen intestacy (one of the largest ever intestate estates), representing well-known boxing promoters on a number of cases (both in the High Court and in front of the British Boxing Board of Control), Apple Corps Ltd v Cooper [1993] FSR 286 (a copyright claim in respect of the Sgt Pepper album cover), Wittman v Willdav [2007] BLR 509 CA (a leading case on guarantees), India Herbs v Hadley & Ottaway (cited in Clerk & Lindsell on Torts at 14-46) and In re Chittock (5th April 2000) TLR (lead case on time for rectification of wills).

• Mediation

  Simon is a qualified family mediator and an accredited CEDR mediator. He undertakes mediation work in TOLATA claims, cross over TOLATA/schedule 1 claims, Inheritance Act claims and family law professional negligence actions’

  Simon is the editor of the Mediation section for Butterworth's Civil Court Precedents.

• Professional Negligence

  Simon appeared in the recent leading professional negligence/family law case of Landsberg v Minkin [2015] EWCA Civ 152 and acts both for claimants and also for insurers acting for family law solicitors against whom claims of professional negligence have been made. 

• What the directories say

  "He is excellent at getting to the heart of the problem and he gives sound advice." Band 4 - Chambers and Partners, 2024

  "His no-nonsense approach straightens out opponents who would otherwise seek to waste court time with bad arguments." - Chambers and Partners, 2024

  "He knows the case inside out, is always extremely well prepared and is great at thinking on his feet." - Chambers and Partners, 2024

  "Simon has a great bedside manner putting clients at ease. He provides straightforward, practical advice. He is very approachable to his instructing solicitor." Legal 500, 2024

  "Simon is very concise, very clear and very good on pleadings. He's a real pleasure to work with as he operates at the right level such that you feel that he's working as part of a team. He's very knowledgeable and you can put your clients in fron of him with confidence." Band 4 - Chambers and Partners, 2023

  "Simon is very, very good at what he does. Engaged with the client, he's very effective and easy to deal with." Band 4 - Chambers and Partners, 2023

  "Simon is an excellent advocate, very knowledgeable and highly empathetic with clients.’"Legal 500, 2023