Nick Green QC and Peter Lodder QC, the outgoing and new Bar Chairs, were accompanied on the trip by leading members of the International Committee and senior representatives of the Bar Council Secretariat.

The trip, in December, included visits to Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, and is the Bar Council’s third trip to the Gulf in successive years. The delegates visited key representatives from the financial services sector, senior government representatives and leading lawyers and academics.
Green said the delegation would be “discussing the ways in which the Bar Council can support the work of legal professionals in the Gulf, focussing in particular on some of the Bar’s specialisms including commercial arbitration and litigation, regulation, taxation, trusts and structured investments and business immigration.

“The Gulf is a growing centre of legal expertise and innovation and the Bar has much insight to gain from the evolution of legal practice in the region. We are especially interested to learn more about the positive innovations in dispute resolution mechanisms and the ways in which we might provide more choice for clients.”

Lodder added that the international work of the Bar would be a major theme of his chairmanship in 2011.