Marc Beaumont FCIArb. (born 6.3.63) is an English Barrister called to the Bar at Gray´s Inn in 1985. As at May 2025, Marc had conducted over 16,000 sets of instructions as a barrister in nearly 40 years at the Bar.
Advocacy
Marc has the ear of the senior judges. In court, he is a voice of maturity, a model of determination, courage and ingenuity, marked by a natural eloquence, sound judgment, intellectual honesty and a 6th sense for the right answer. His cross-examinations are often highly effective. His many successes over the years are the product of a single-minded commitment to hard work, intense focus and an undiluted loyalty to his many happy clients.
Marc’s written advocacy has been described as some of the best work ever seen by other senior barristers and KCs.
Watch Marc’ Beaumont’s Supreme Court advocacy here
Watch Marc Beaumont’s Court of Appeal advocacy here
Legal practice – England & Wales
Marc Beaumont divides his practice between commercial/chancery work and professional disciplinary cases. In 2025, Marc successfully led the team in the landmark decision of the Supreme Court, in Waller Edwards v One Savings Bank plc [2025] SC 22, which extends the constructive notice principles in RBS v Etridge No 2 to hybrid mortgage advances. by requiring all UK banks to comply with a bright line rule about recommending independent legal advice in such cases.
Marc has specialised in property and banking law for many years, having acted in the House of Lords in Abbey National v Cann [1991] 1 AC 56, when only 5 years of call.
Marc is also highly experienced in High Court judicial review work, having conducted a number of leading cases, such as the landmark decision in Kaur v Institute of Legal Executives [2011] EWCA Civ 1168, as well as leading cases in the UK education law field such as Reg v Rotherham MBC ex parte Clark & others [1998] 2 ELR 152, CA.
Defending barristers, solicitors and other professionals
Marc has been active throughout his career in the defence of other lawyers (especially Barristers) in professional disciplinary proceedings. He is recommended by word of mouth to act for barristers of all seniority, including KCs. In 2012, he was described on the BBC Radio 4 Today Programme as, “the Barrister’s Barrister,” a public accolade deriving from his successful and fearless defence of Barristers in disciplinary proceedings. He is a prominent advocate of adherence to due process in such proceedings. The revelation in 2012 of systemic maladministration of the Bar’s disciplinary processes over many years, led Marc to describe the system as being in a “shambolic state,” when others were not willing to be so frank, a description that was broadcast with positive effects. Marc Beaumont has obtained a number of notable victories against the legal regulators in high profile cases. In Kaur v Institute of Legal Executives [2011] EWCA Civ 1168, Marc persuaded the English Court of Appeal that it was unlawful for ILEX Councillors and its Vice President to sit as a disciplinary tribunal when ILEX was also the prosecutor, a decision which has led to change within a number of regulatory bodies.
In July 2012, it was revealed by the Council of the Inns of Court that about 700 disciplinary findings of guilt against Barristers had been procured before panels of ineligible Barrister and lay members. Marc acted as counsel in the ensuing test cases grouped together as Russell v Bar Standards Board. Marc is the architect of BCAS, the disciplinary and advisory service for Barristers created in 1996.
Marc Beaumont has published the popular book Beaumont on Barristers: a Guide to defending disciplinary proceedings (2nd ed)
International practice
Marc Beaumont was called to the New York Bar as a FLC in 2013. He offers a niche consultancy in English commercial law and ADR in the USA.
ADR
Marc is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (Diploma in International Arbitration), is an Arbitrator and has been an accredited commercial Mediator since 2004.
Direct Access to Barristers
Marc was the architect in 2000 of the original scheme of direct access to the Bar. Since 2004, he has become a recognised pioneer of and innovator in the field of direct access to the Bar and has built arguably the leading on-line barrister direct access practice in England & Wales. But despite being known as “Mr Direct Access,” Marc works closely with a number of UK and international law firms and other instructing entities. He is now authorised to conduct litigation in his own right.
Marc was a 4-time elected member of the plenary Bar Council between 1996 and 2010 and Vice Chairman of the Bar Council’s Access to the Bar Committee from 2009 to 2012. He was Chair of the UK Public Access Bar Association (PABA) from 2007 to 2013. He has been appointed its Lifetime President in recognition of his extraordinary (albeit unsung) contribution to the creation of the Bar’s Public Access scheme – a scheme now embraced by the majority of practising Barristers. He acted in the first direct access case to reach the English Court of Appeal, GE Capital Bank Ltd v Rushton & Jenking [2006] 1 WLR 899, in recognition of which he was The London Times’ “Lawyer of the Week” in 2006. It was Marc Beaumont who alone advocated successfully on the Bar Council that the Bar Public Access scheme be further expanded to allow Barristers to conduct correspondence (something the English Bar had never done before).