Dr Robert Gaitskell KC

• Dr Gaitskell has conducted over 200 arbitrations, throughout the world. He regularly lectures on the subject, including for the ICC, SIMC, CIArb etc.

• Party Nominated Arbitrator in an ICDR Arbitration under AAA Rules regarding an oil rig (Seat in Houston). Robert Gaitskell is on the AAA Roster of Arbitrators.

• ICC arbitrations regarding disputes arising out of the construction of the Panama Canal (seat Miami).

• Member of arbitration tribunals dealing with inter alia, disputes concerning an under-sea fibre-optic cable, an Indian housing project, an Iraqi power station, and a Russian oil and gas project.

• Chairman of ICC arbitration tribunals hearing, amongst other things, multi-million pound disputes concerning offshore oil exploration, a Ukrainian infrastructure project and a US military facility.

• Sole arbitrator dealing with an Omani power station, a Caribbean hospital, a Middle East commercial building, an infrastructure project in the D.R of the Congo, a gas engineering plant and a Hong Kong public works project.

• Acted as adjudicator on over 50 major disputes relating to engineering, energy and infrastructure disputes. He is the named adjudicator in various Channel Tunnel Rail Link contracts, and has conducted a number of adjudications on this project.

• Regularly appointed by the President of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IEE/IET) in respect of electrical and mechanical engineering disputes and by CEDR on domestic and international adjudications.

• Advised the construction industries in two foreign countries as regards the introduction of statutory adjudication, and lectures widely on the subject.

More detailed information is available on request.

Dr. Gaitskell has for a number of years, until recently, been the chairman of the European ITER nuclear fusion project Dispute Board. He is an experienced Dispute Board (DB) Chairman who lectures and writes upon the process. Robert Gaitskell gave an International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Lecture on Dispute Boards at the launch of the ICC’s DB Rules, and recently gave an ICC lecture on Dispute Boards. A paper by him on the subject is available on the Society of Construction Law website. He recently lectured at the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators on DBs.

Robert Gaitskell is also the Editor of the Keating Construction Dispute Resolution Handbook (3rd edition 2016), in which he deals with the DB procedure in international disputes.

His current and recent DRB appointments include:
 

• conducting a Dispute Board relating to the Caribbean oil industry;

• chairing two dispute boards concerning one of the world’s largest power stations, based in Africa;

• acting as Dispute Review Board Chairman in respect of a World Bank funded telecommunications project in India;

• acting as Sole Member for a DB procedure concerning a defence installation project; and

• acting as Dispute Board Chairman in respect of two major (£0.5 billion each) construction projects involving the British MOD.

Robert Gaitskell has carried out over100 mediations in the commercial, construction, engineering and intellectual property sectors; many abroad including Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and South Africa. He is one of the Bar Council’s recommended experienced mediators at the Bar. He is recommended by ‘The Legal 500’ as a leading mediator. He has recently lectured in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and at the IBA conference on oil and gas mediations.

Recent appointments (drawing on Dr. Gaitskell’s status as a Chartered Engineer) concern a Zambian mine plant and a Middle East power station.

• Advised a European contractor on claims regarding power station desulphurisation conversion.

• Advised a major Scottish engineering contractor on delay and loss and expense claim.

• Advised the Corporation of London on a multi-million pound professional negligence claim in a complex engineering project.

• Advised on the decommissioning of a major UK power station.

• Represented a foreign government in the Privy Council in a sewerage project dispute.

• Advised a foreign government on a major national library project.

Dr Gaitskell has worked in (amongst other places) the United States, Canada, Mexico, Denmark, Hong Kong, Malaysia, India, Poland, Singapore, South Africa, Mauritius, Switzerland, Belgium, Panama, France, New Zealand, Australia, Zimbabwe, Taiwan, Korea, Trinidad and Tobago, the Dominican Republic, Dubai, Oman and Abu Dhabi.