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Rob Elvin
Partner
Rob Elvin is a solicitor-advocate, head of our European Environmental Safety & Health Practice Group and the firm’s training principal. Following outstanding client feedback, Rob was recognised as a star lawyer in the Acritas Stars global database, cited as having “full confidence in his experience and his knowledge, and he was very pragmatic in terms of finding a solution to the issue.”
Rob primarily focuses on leading large and complex investigations across a broad range of health, safety and environmental matters. His expertise also covers nuisance, noise abatement, pollution, permit appeals and judicial review, and he is renowned for corporate defence (including corporate manslaughter), inquest law, public inquiries, and product safety, liability and recall.
He has particular sector expertise in the energy sector, including nuclear, gas and electricity generation and distribution, and wind energy, as well as the chemicals, engineering and construction, and sports and entertainment industries.
Rob is accredited by the Institute of Industrial Accident Investigators as a qualified lead accident investigator and regularly provides training and lectures on issues such as corporate manslaughter, product safety and defending all manner of regulatory prosecutions.
Rob is a trustee and board member of the Social Mobility Business Partnership.
- Representing organisations in matters arising out of the Manchester Arena, Post Office, Covid and Scottish Hospitals Public Inquiries.
- Advising organisations and individuals in relation to the Grenfell fire investigation (Operation Northleigh).
- Leading a client review for a professional football club into historic child abuse allegations dating back to the 1960s.
- Advising PLC boards on the handling of regulatory investigations, interviews under compulsion and under caution.
- Advising companies in relation to anticorruption programmes and the Bribery Act 2010, including self-reporting and internal investigations.
- Advising one of the UK’s largest energy generators in respect of various prosecutions brought by the Office for Nuclear Regulation.
- Advising a gas distribution company in relation to one of the largest HSE prosecutions in the UK arising out of various alleged breaches over many years of offending.
- Leading the investigation and advising in relation to HSE enforcement action following a fire at an oil refinery.
- Representing one of the world's largest chemical companies in an HSE prosecution following a fatal chemical leak.
- Investigating an INES II incident at a nuclear power station.
- Representing an energy-from-waste incinerator company in judicial review of the EA following revocation of the PRM accreditation.
- Advising an outdoor media-advertising client on several serious H&S construction incidents, including successfully appealing an improvement notice following the fall from a wall of a four-tonne digital advertising board that crushed a member of the public.
- Representing a music venue operator in an ongoing corporate manslaughter investigation.
- Advising company directors on PACE interviews for manslaughter.
- Advising a European car manufacturer on corporate manslaughter.
- Representing a premier league football club (as solicitor-advocate) at the inquest into the suicide of a former academy player.
- Dealing with inquests, including workplace suicides, fatal accidents in the workplace and a case involving the murder of an aid worker in Nigeria.
- Advising a UK car manufacturer, a major charity, a stair lift manufacturer and an engine manufacturer on product recalls.
- Project managing global product recalls of a child baby stroller and of stair lifts.
- Representing an energy company in an Office for Nuclear investigation into IT security processes and obligations under nuclear security law.
- Successfully defending a toxic tort group action arising out of claims of harm caused by historic contamination of land used for residential housing.
- Successfully representing a waste client in a group litigation case concerning an alleged odour nuisance claim at a material recovery facility.
Education
- Sheffield Hallam University, LL.B.
- University of Salford, M.A.
Admissions
- England and Wales, 1995
Memberships & Affiliations
- Institute of Industrial Accident Investigations
- Recommended in Chambers UK 2022 for Health & Safety, UK-wide and Environment, The North
- Recommended in Legal 500 UK 2023 for Health and Safety; Product Liability – defendant; Environment; Commercial Litigation; Planning and Environment, with client feedback noting “Rob Elvin is excellent. He’s strategic, calm, highly expert and my business’s go-to external lawyer on H&S matters. He’s aware of business context and very good at communicating at the business exec level.”
- Recommended as a Leading Individual and selected for the Hall of Fame in Legal 500 UK 2023 for Health and Safety
- Recognised by The Best Lawyers in the United Kingdom for Health and Safety Law
- Recognised as a Star Lawyer in the Acritas Stars global database, 2020
- Awarded Partner of the Year at the Manchester Legal Awards
- Recognised as a Leading Individual by Chambers UK