Christopher McHugh

Practice overview

Christopher joined Gatehouse Chambers as a probationary tenant in October 2026. He has a broad interest in commercial disputes, with a particular focus on construction and engineering matters. Within Chambers’ areas of practice, he is particularly drawn to commercial dispute resolution, construction, insurance, professional liability and international arbitration.

Christopher completed pupillage at a specialist commercial set. During pupillage, he assisted on a range of construction and energy disputes, but the issues he worked on ran across the breadth of commercial law:

• Contract and remedies: the interpretation and rectification of heavily amended standard forms; capped liquidated damages and exclusive remedy clauses; assignment and novation; transferred loss; statutory limitation and contractual time bars.
• Insurance: whether losses were recoverable under a policy of insurance, and the operation of insurance provisions in building contracts.
• Litigation and arbitration: consequential matters following a substantial Commercial Court trial; an application for permission to appeal to the Supreme Court; complex procedural matters in international arbitrations.
• Construction and building safety: fire safety and structural defects claims under the Defective Premises Act 1972 and the Building Safety Act 2022; payment, delay and jurisdiction disputes in adjudication.
• Professional negligence and tort: claims against a construction professionals; concurrent duties in contract and tort; contribution.

Christopher read Jurisprudence at the University of Oxford and won several prizes for academic achievement. He was made an academic scholar of Keble College in 2022. He continued at Keble to read for the BCL as the Gabriel Moss QC Scholar 2023-24, and took papers in Commercial Remedies and Restitution of Unjust Enrichment.

Christopher mooted with considerable success as a student. He was a member of the Oxford team that won the UK rounds of the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition in 2022 and went on to win the award for ‘Best Overall Applicant’ in the White & Case International Rounds (out of 580 teams). He also won the Annual Inner Temple Inter-Varsity Moot (2024), the University of Nottingham Moot Cup (2023) and the Herbert Smith Freehills-Oxford Disability Mooting Championship (2022).

Following the BCL, Christopher obtained the highest overall distinction on the Bar Course at BPP (1 out of 217), including receiving the highest mark in each of the BSB Civil and Criminal Litigation exams.