Paul is a regular speaker and commentator on environmental law and policy.
Having been in private practice, a senior lawyer for Defra, the Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Environment Agency, Paul’s clients benefit from his understanding of how different parties are likely to approach a problem.
Paul’s experience includes:
· Advising on compliance with climate change regimes, environmental permitting of waste, compliance with packaging waste obligations, water discharges, water abstraction, land drainage works and wildlife and habitats consents. Paul was Defra’s lead lawyer advising on reforms to the water abstraction regime introduced under the Water Act 2003.
· Advising UK Government on energy efficiency policies and drafting legislation, including the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) Energy Efficiency Scheme and the Climate Change Agreements scheme. Paul advises on the enforcement of these schemes and others, including the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS), the Fluorinated Greenhouse Gases regime and the Ozone Depleting Substances regime.
· Representing clients in successfully defending more than one hundred appeals against civil penalties in the First-tier Tribunal and the Upper Tribunal. Advising on regulatory investigations and incident response management. Advising on civil sanctions, enforcement undertakings and related legal and reputational risk management.
· Advising on ‘green’ advertising and products stewardship regimes, including producer responsibility obligations, the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, REACH, PFAS, WEEE and the Energy Using Products regulations.
· Advising on duties under the Freedom of Information Act and Environmental Information Regulations, and the protection of commercially sensitive information from public disclosure.
· Supporting the Environmental Services Association (ESA) on its response to the UK ETS Authority on proposals to expand the scheme to include energy from waste, including on what the potential implications of the expansion of the UK ETS might mean for the recycling and waste management sector.
· Supporting the Corry review into the regulation and regulators at Defra.