Health and Safety Lawyers Association
Annual Conference 2026
Presentations
Table of Contents
Timetable and presentations
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Control the Controllable – Lessons from the Cockpit for Health & Safety Law.
Mental Health and Health and Safety Lawyers – pressure, practice and protection
Interviews under caution? Written representations? NO COMMENT!
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12.30 – 1.00 pm
Registration with refreshments
Please join us for refreshments over the registration period.
1.00 -1.15 pm
Conference Opening and AGM
Amy is HSLA Chair and currently is in house Senior Legal Counsel at Adura Energy Limited.
1.15 – 2.10 pm
Keynote speaker: Control the Controllable – Lessons from the Cockpit for Health & Safety Law
Speaker: Chris Moon MBE
Chris shares his unique experiences on the balance of life and death and limit of human endurance in a humorous and uplifting way to illustrate principles we can use in our daily lives. His background leading large teams in high-risk operations in hazardous areas gives him a unique perspective to explain the human cost of accidents, the psychology of risk and why people do dangerous things. He’ll also share principles of mental wellness which will help us to be happier, heathier, energised and more resilient.
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Chris Moon is the luckiest person to be alive you’re likely to meet. When it comes to challenging the concept of limitation, he literally walks the talk. He’s a former army officer who left to work for a charity clearing landmines and is one of the few westerners to survive as a prisoner of the Khmer Rouge negotiating his release and that of two Cambodian colleagues.
He was blown up in 1995 walking in a safe area losing his right arm and leg. He treated himself and survived against all odds. Within a year of leaving hospital, he successfully completed a master’s degree, taught himself to run again and completed the London Marathon. He became the world’s first amputee ultra-distance runner and has completed the Badwater Death Valley 135 mile ultra through the hottest place on earth six times.
2:10 – 2:50 pm
Panel Session: Animating the Jury
Chair:
Harry Vann, Crown Office Chambers
Billy, Jan and Harry discuss the opportunities for the use of animation in health & safety prosecutions: the development of animation in recent years, its role and value in health & safety proceedings, avoidance of bias, and what the future holds. Discussion of Gaussian splatting cannot be ruled out.
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Harry has been part of the Crown Office Chambers Criminal Regulatory team since 2008. He represents corporates of all sizes and natures and their officers in Enforcement Notice proceedings and prosecutions across a wide spectrum of industries. He lives in York, and sits as a Recorder in crime on the North Eastern Circuit. He was Chambers & Partners Health & Safety Junior of the Year in 2021.
Panel:
Billy Hanshaw, Incident Films
Billy is the founder of Incident Films, where he delivers structured visual evidence for legal teams, investigators, and regulatory bodies handling matters under formal scrutiny. His work spans incident reconstruction, environmental and mechanical visualisation, process walkthroughs, and evidential presentations, supporting cases where written and verbal explanation alone falls short. He is the developer of Cognitive Focus, a science-based framework for structuring complex information.
Jan Andreson, HSE Principal Specialist Inspector (Construction)
Jan is a Member of the Institution of Structural Engineers and one of His Majesty’s Principal Specialist Inspectors of Health and Safety. He has been employed in a professional capacity in the construction industry since 1985. After working for several consulting engineering practices and a contractor’s design office, he joined the Health and Safety Executive in 2002 as a Specialist Inspector of Health and Safety (Construction) and became a Principal Specialist Inspector in 2014
He is the HSE technical lead for structures and demolition. This involves liaising with industry (professional institutions and trade bodies) and leading HSE’s technical overview of structural stability considerations during construction, demolition and temporary works. Part of his work is giving professional and technical advice to inspectors on health and safety matters arising within the civil engineering, building, demolition and associated industries. This embraces safety in design, safety engineering, safety management, safe systems of work, and product and plant safety.
Over the past 24 years, in addition to assisting on a number of high-profile investigations, he has regularly been appointed as an independent expert witness and given evidence. Throughout that time, he has commissioned animations to assist in explaining events.
2.50-3.20 pm
Break. Refreshments Teas, coffees and networking
3.20-4.00 pm
Panel session: Mental Health and Health and Safety Lawyers – pressure, practice and protection
Chair:
Lynne Gray, Partner at Burness Paull LLP
The session will explore mental health challenges in health and safety legal practice, drawing on professional, institutional and support perspectives. It aims to encourage open discussion and highlight the support available across the profession.
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Lynne is a partner in Burness Paull’s Disputes and Regulatory team. Health and safety is core to her corporate crime practice, handling contentious and non-contentious health and safety matters for key corporate clients. She has extensive experience in complex oil and gas cases including major hazard incidents, high potential events and multiple casualties and leads on health and safety investigations, often under legal privilege. Lynne sits on Burness Paull’s Respect and Inclusion Committee.
Panel:
Nicky Lloyd, Red Legal Practice Management and committee member of the Law Society of England and Wales Leadership & Management Section
Nicky is Chief Operating Officer and founder of Red Legal Practice Management. She specialises in financial strategy, profitability and operational leadership, working with boards and partners to translate strategy into delivery. She is also COO of Streathers Solicitors, where she leads firm-wide operations and focuses on improving financial performance and governance. She is a committee member of the Law Society of England and Wales Leadership & Management Section and a regular speaker on law firm strategy and operations.
Emma Williams, Law Care
Emma is a solicitor by background and an experienced litigator, now specialising in anti money laundering and law firm risk and compliance. Alongside her legal career, she is a lecturer, trainer, and certified mindfulness coach, and works as a stress, wellbeing and resilience consultant. She serves as a MLRO and is a member of The Law Society’s Economic Crime Task Force. Nicky is also a trustee of LawCare.
4.00-4.40 pm
Panel session:
Interviews under caution? Written representations? NO COMMENT!
- When should your client answer questions?
- Are prepared statements ever ok?
- Who’s afraid of an adverse inference?
- Why bother with written representations?
This session offers the prospect of some lively debate with the issues seen through the eyes of a solicitor, counsel and a fascinating Scottish perspective.
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Panel:
Emma Toner KC, Compass Chambers
Emma’s principal areas of practice are regulatory crime and Fatal Accident Inquiries in Scotland. She is ranked Band 1 in Health & Safety and Public & Fatal Accident Inquiries in Chambers UK 2026; and Crime and Regulatory in Legal 500 2026. Emma has been instructed in many of the most significant Fatal Accident Inquiries and Public Inquiries in recent years and has appeared on behalf of companies, public bodies, professionals and private individuals.
Miles Bennett, 5 Paper Buildings
After several years of sex, drugs and murder at the Criminal Bar, Miles (Milo) now specialises in Health and Safety, Consumer Law and Inquests. He was once described as the “Rolls Royce of Consumer Lawyers”…but no one knows who by. Milo was instructed as junior counsel for the defence in the first ever acquittal at trial of a company charged with Corporate Manslaughter. He represented the tram driver in the Croydon/Sandilands inquest and to defend the tram driver in the subsequent health and safety prosecution in which the tram driver was acquitted. He was leading junior in the inquest into the death of Leon Briggs, a death in custody case, representing two custody sergeants and a detention officer. It was one of the first Article 2 death in custody cases post Maughan.
Milo is an optimist. He supports QPR.
Gary Rubin, Blackfords LLP
Gary is a Partner at Blackfords LLP and heads the Regulatory Team. He has a particular emphasis on all aspects of employment-related criminal matters and Health and Safety and Regulatory Law. He acts for individuals, companies and other organisations and specialises in investigations and prosecutions of corporate manslaughter or manslaughter by gross negligence where there has been a workplace fatality. He has represented clients in high profile and complex cases.
4.40-5:20 pm
Panel session: The Abolition of Jury Trials
“Trial by jury is more than an instrument of justice and more than one wheel of the constitution: it is the lamp that shows that freedom lives.” Lord Devlin
Chair:
James Maxwell-Scott KC, Crown Office Chambers
Zoe Betts, Valerie Charbit, Mark Balysz KC and James Maxwell-Scott KC discuss the implications for organisations, individuals and practitioners of the proposed restrictions on jury trials. What will be the impact on our practice area and how can we prepare for it?
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James is Vice-Chair of the HSLA and a specialist in public inquiries, inquests and criminal regulatory law. He was Leading Counsel for the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the Grenfell Tower Inquiry and for the Ministry of Justice in the COVID-19 Inquiry. He also sits part-time as a Recorder in the Crown Court and as an Assistant Coroner in Hertfordshire.
Panel:
Zoe Betts, Partner, Pinsent Masons
Zoe is a Criminal Regulatory Law specialist who advises on Health and Safety, Food Safety, Product Safety and Licensing Law.
Mark Balysz KC, Crown Office Chambers
Mark Balysz KC is one of the leading and most effective advocates in defending high profile cases of corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter, as well as complex health and safety offences, Maritime Coastguard Agency prosecutions, fire safety, environmental offences, fraud and corruption. Mark’s practice also encompasses high profile inquests and inquiries, including both the Grenfell and Covid inquiries.
Valerie Charbitt, Red Lion Court
Valerie’s diverse practice spans serious criminal cases including Health & Safety offences, Fraud, Murder & Manslaughter and Sexual Offences. She is an experienced advocate in representing core participants in Inquiries and interested persons in Inquests. She also represents professionals before a number of regulators in Professional Discipline proceedings. She is instructed in the Lampard Inquiry and was instructed in the Grenfell Tower Inquiry.
5.20 – 5.30 pm
