Ross Anderson new King’s Counsel appointment at Ampersand Advocates
Congratulations to Ampersand’s Ross Anderson KC on taking silk. Ross is amongst sixteen new silks announced today, appointed by His Majesty the King on the recommendation of First Minister John Swinney.
The rank of King’s Counsel is generally reserved for those who have distinguished themselves in practice in the Supreme Courts. Advocates and Solicitors with Rights of Audience in the Supreme Courts are eligible to apply to the Lord Justice General, Scotland’s senior judge. Before making nominations to the First Minister, the Lord Justice General consults other judges, the Lord Advocate, the Dean of the Faculty of Advocates and the President of the Law Society of Scotland.
Ross’s practice focuses on commercial dispute resolution, company and insolvency law, property law, public law, trusts and tax. Ross was a standing junior counsel to the UK Government (having been assigned to HM Revenue & Customs from 2015-2024). He appears regularly in UK tribunals as well as in the Court of Session.
Stable Director Isla Davie KC said: “I congratulate Ross on this well deserved appointment as King’s Counsel. He is an excellent Advocate held in high regard in the profession and this appointment further strengthens Ampersand’s offering of first class Senior Counsel.”
The full list of new silks can be found on the Judiciary of Scotland website here.
Court of Session issues decision on Scottish Ministers’ petition for removal of Irish Travellers from Edinburgh development site
[2026] CSOH 82 – Petition of the Scottish Ministers for an order under section 46 of the Court of Session Act 1988 and for interdict and interdict ad interim
Lady Tait has issued an opinion in a case where the petitioners, the Scottish Ministers, sought an order under section 46 of the Court of Session Act 1988: (i) ordering the occupants to remove themselves, their caravans and all other goods from the site to restore possession of the site to the petitioners; and (ii) to interdict the occupants from entering the site.
Chris Stephen was instructed by the Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) as the First Interested Party to produce a Minute of Written Submission addressing the UNCRC requirements under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation)(Scotland) Act 2024.
Summary
The petitioners are proprietors of an area of land. Planning permission has been granted for the development of the site. The respondent Is an Irish Traveller. The respondent and his family have occupied an area of the site since 2024. The respondent submitted that in circumstances where no culturally appropriate accommodation would be made available on eviction, the orders would constitute an unlawful interference with the respondent’s rights under Articles 8 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights (“ECHR”). It was also submitted they would also be incompatible with the respondent’s children’s rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (“UNCRC”).
Outcome
There was no dispute that the petitioners’ redevelopment project was capable of constituting a legitimate aim, and that vacant possession of the site was rationally connected to that objective. The question for the court was whether an order to evict the respondent in the absence of appropriate alternative accommodation was a proportionate means of achieving that legitimate aim. Lady Tait concluded that there was no less intrusive measure than eviction and that the importance and urgency of the petitioners’ objectives outweighed the severity of the effect of the eviction. In those circumstances, the interference with the respondent’s Article 8 rights was proportionate. Nor was there an evidential basis to submit that the family had been discriminated against by the petitioners under Article 14.
With regards to the children’s rights under the UNCRC, it was accepted that the petitioners and the court were exercising a relevant function under the 2024 Act. However, there was no less intrusive measure than eviction and that the importance and urgency of the petitioners’ objectives outweighed the severity of the effect of the eviction. The current absence of accommodation did not elevate the site into one which was appropriate for the family and which served the children’s best interests.
Lady Tait granted the prayer of the petition and the orders sought. The opinion is available on the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service website here.
Lord Braid has issued a single opinion addressing three petitions presented to the Court of Session within a period of around two weeks, each inviting the court to exercise its parens patriae jurisdiction to authorise medical treatment for a child whose parents had refused consent.
Three members of Ampersand appeared for the petitioning health boards, instructed in each case by the NHS Scotland Central Legal Office: Scott Clair for Greater Glasgow Health Board in respect of child A, Louise Jardine for Greater Glasgow Health Board in respect of child B, and Paul Reid KC for Borders Health Board in respect of child C.
The three cases
Child A was a 13-year-old boy with medulloblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer. He had severe non-verbal autism and was assessed as lacking capacity to make decisions about his healthcare. He and his parents are Jehovah’s Witnesses, and his parents had confirmed that they would not consent to the transfusion of primary blood components. Authority was sought for a course of radiotherapy followed by chemotherapy, and for transfusion if the treating clinician considered it necessary to avoid serious harm including death.
Child B was a 3-year-old requiring an open pyeloplasty for a pelvi-ureteric junction obstruction, whose surgery had been complicated by a subsequent diagnosis of sickle cell disease. His parents, also Jehovah’s Witnesses, refused consent to any blood products. Clinicians had used an alternative regimen to raise his haemoglobin above the surgical threshold, but could not rule transfusion out entirely, particularly in the event of post-operative complications.
Child C was a 10-year-old girl bitten by the family dog, who required tetanus-containing vaccination and immunoglobulin within four days of the injury. She had not previously been vaccinated. Her parents refused consent and, unlike in the first two cases, actively opposed the petition, disputing the medical evidence and addressing the court both orally and in writing.
In each case a curator ad litem was appointed on presentation of the petition, each curator supported the petition, and the court granted an order permitting medical intervention — though not, in every case, in the terms originally sought.
Points of wider significance
Lord Braid took the opportunity to address several matters going beyond the individual cases.
On the scope of the jurisdiction, he held that a child need not be an orphan for parens patriae to be engaged. Where the welfare of the child requires parental consent to a necessary procedure and that consent is not available, it does not matter whether the reason is that no parent is alive, that a parent cannot be found, or that a parent is refusing consent on religious, moral or life-choice grounds. In such circumstances the court is, in effect, “acting as a third parent.”
He emphasised that any such authorisation is an exception to parental autonomy and an interference by an organ of the state in family life. It must be a proportionate response to a material risk, and requires a balancing exercise at the heart of which lies the welfare of the child, but in which the parents’ wishes, religious beliefs and right to parental autonomy must also be weighed.
On the limits of the jurisdiction, the opinion is instructive. In child C’s case, the petition as presented had also sought authority for two further doses of vaccine at monthly intervals. The curator elicited from the treating clinician that those doses were not related to the acute episode but were intended to bring the child into the routine childhood vaccination schedule. The court observed that this would go considerably beyond the proper compass of an exception to parental autonomy; the jurisdiction enables the court to intervene in urgent situations, not to impose measures against parents’ wishes. Senior counsel for the health board confirmed at the interim hearing that the order was no longer sought in those terms.
On procedure, the opinion confirms that RCS 14.7 states in terms that a parens patriae petition shall not be intimated on the walls of court, and that it is not open to the court to waive that requirement. There is accordingly no need to seek dispensation. Open justice is served by the petitions being heard in open court, with the family’s privacy preserved by anonymity orders.
The opinion also addresses the interaction with the UNCRC (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024, the court being satisfied that the UNCRC requirements were in any event consistent with Scots law.
Finally, in a postscript prompted by a recent academic suggestion that a child protection order should be sought in such cases, Lord Braid expressed no concluded view but observed that it had not struck him that a child protection order ought to have been sought in any of the three cases. There were no social work concerns; all were loving parents acting in accordance with what they perceived to be their child’s best interests; and it is not obvious that the statutory mechanism provides the same safeguards, including the power to seek a curator’s report and the hearing of applications in public. As Lord Braid put it, “the procedural cart must not drive the welfare horse.”
The opinion is available on the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service website here.
Ampersand Advocates’ Tony Convery acted as junior counsel for the successful petitioner (with Aidan O’Neill KC as Senior Counsel), instructed by Balfour + Manson.
The petitioner challenged guidance (“Prisons Guidance”) issued by the Scottish Prison Service, related to the management of transgender prisoners.
Lady Ross held that the relevant statutory schemes required separate prison accommodation for men and women, in accordance with biological sex.
She found that the Prisons Guidance conflicted with those requirements insofar as it purported to allow the Scottish Prison Service to accommodate transgender prisoners in prisons for the opposite biological sex.
She also found that the application of the Prisons Guidance by the Scottish Ministers would be outside their powers under the Scotland Act 1998.
& the devil is in the detail: Laura-anne Langlands
In this Ampersand Live session, Alan Moffat sits down with Laura-anne Langlands as she prepares to call as an advocate at Ampersand.
Now available on demand – this was broadcast live on Monday 15 June 2026 at 12.30pm, with questions from Deputy Clerk, Sheena Hume.
Laura-anne talks candidly about her journey to the Scottish Bar – the experiences and influences that shaped her decision, the moment she knew advocacy was the right path, and the intensity of the devilling process at the Faculty of Advocates. She also shares her plans for calling and beyond: the areas of law she’s passionate about and the kind of work she hopes to take on as she begins her career as an advocate.
Whether you’re considering a career at the Bar, looking to instruct new counsel, or simply curious about the journey from solicitor to advocate, Laura-anne’s story offers a compelling insight into the next generation at Ampersand.
We are please to announce Paul Reid KC has called to the Bar of England and Wales and joins Cornerstone Barristers as a tenant. Paul remains a member of Ampersand Advocates for his work in Scotland and will practice in both jurisdictions.
Paul joins Cornerstone Chambers with a distinguished practice in public, regulatory and healthcare law. A silk in Scotland since 2023, he previously served as First Standing Junior Counsel to the Scottish Government, advising and appearing in a number of high-profile constitutional and public law cases, including the 2022 Referendum Reference before the Supreme Court.
Alongside his public law work, Paul has extensive experience advising the NHS in Scotland and medical defence unions on clinical liability and regulatory matters.
In this Ampersand Live session, Alan Moffat sits down with Laura-anne Langlands as she prepares to call as an advocate at Ampersand.