Kevin Smyth

Background Summary

• CEDR Accredited Civil & Commercial Mediator
• CEDR Panel Mediator since 1999
• Appointed member of CEDR’S Trusts, Wills and Probate Panel
• Member of the Court of Appeal’s Mediation Panel since 2003
• Solicitor (now non practising) and former Senior Partner and Head of Litigation
• When still practising was an appointee of several Law Society Specialist Panels
• Industry trainer
• Author of articles for legal press
• Appointed a Fellow of the Civil Mediation Council in 2021

Client Feedback

“…sensible, thoughtful, and finally managed to broker an agreement when initially the parties were poles apart… He is uniquely qualified to be a mediator. He is dedicated, organised, experienced and proficient… It was a privilege to witness your calm, measured, authoritative yet warm approach and your making of strategically correct decisions at every stage”.

Overview

Kevin Smyth is a retired solicitor having formerly been a Director, Senior Partner, and Head of Litigation of his firm. Since 1st May 2016, he has been a full-time mediator with over 25 years’ experience. He has conducted over 150 mediations in cases relating to wide variety of disputes and industries, more than 80% of which have resulted in a settlement being reached on or soon after the mediation day. Kevin was first appointed to the Court of Appeal’s Panel of Mediators in October 2003, and he continues to be a member of it. In April 2021, he was made a Fellow of the Civil Mediation Council.

Both as a mediator and/or legal representative in mediations, Kevin has been involved in cases concerning personal injury, clinical and other professional negligence, shareholder and partnership disputes, franchising, life and other insurance indemnities, race discrimination, employment (including workplace mediations for which he is CEDR trained and accredited to conduct), disputed wills and other contentious probate disputes including Inheritance (Provision for Family & Dependants) Act claims, Court of Protection, financial provision following separation/divorce and many different types of other commercial and personal disputes.

Professional Background

Throughout his post admission career as a Solicitor, Kevin practiced solely as a civil litigation lawyer. For much of that time, he did so in the professional and clinical negligence/personal injury arenas. In the case of the latter, he successfully prosecuted three claims that resulted in awards of damages exceeding £3 – £4 million. Other special areas of practice involved Shareholder/Partnership and other commercial disputes, contested wills/probate cases, employment law and family/matrimonial property disputes. Kevin is also a highly experienced practitioner of independent chairing in the public and private sectors. He has chaired numerous appeal hearings of the Legal Aid Agency’s National Special Review Controls Panel as well as its Funding Review Committees. He has also chaired meetings related to employment and workplace issues and was the Chairman of the Board of Governors of a well-known large independent secondary school for six years.

Mediation Expertise

• Assertion by close relative of deceased that £100,000.00 paid to him was a gift and not a loan.
• Will disputed consequent upon allegations of lack of testamentary capacity – Estate value £3.5 million.
• Application by one sibling for further financial provision from her late mother’s Estate (value £2 million +) which was contested by another sibling.
• Claim for unpaid wages and monetary employment law statutory entitlements against a deceased’s estate and associated issues relating to both the validity and enforceability of a Legal Charge allegedly signed and intended to provide security for the same.
• Court of Appeal mediation involving one relative’s (in his capacity as a PR of his late father) wish to overturn the decision in the court below that another (a sibling of the deceased father in her own right and, also, as PR of her late husband) should not have to pay an occupational rent in respect of accommodation in which she and her family had been resident for upwards of 15 years.
• Proprietary estoppel and constructive trust claims by a dispossessed co-owner (following the severance some years before of a joint tenancy) in respect of the beneficial interests in a family home: claims for occupational rent on the part of that co-owner and as to not only the admitted 1/3 of the equity, but the remaining 2/3 as well.
• Claim made by a former wife of a deceased ex-husband for financial and other provision pursuant to the provisions of sections 1 (1) b, 2 and 14 of The Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 on the grounds that the disposition of the deceased’s estate affected by his Will was not such as to make reasonable financial provision for her. Under the terms of that Will executed shortly before he died, the deceased made no provision at all for his former wife and instead left 45% of the residue of his estate to their only child aged 18 at the time of the Mediation and the rest to other family members, including his mother and siblings.
• Dispute between siblings following the death of their parents relating to the dissolution proceeds of a farming partnership and the ownership of farmland (and related proprietary estoppel as well as Agricultural Holdings Act 1986 tenant’s statutory protection issues) which were to be the subject of a Court of Appeal determination.

When in practice as a Solicitor, Kevin regularly prosecuted and defended claims that were made by clients when Wills had been contested or, alternatively, when applications were made for further financial provision pursuant to the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975.
He also represented clients in mediations when such claims, as well as proprietary estoppel claims, were being prosecuted or defended.