Gareth Shires

Call 2007

"He is the guru on emissions”

Chambers UK 2025

Expertise

Gareth has significant clinical negligence experience in serious injury cases and acts mainly for claimants.

He is keen to be involved with cases at an early stage and is happy to advise informally and meet with lay clients.  He understands the need to ensure that expert evidence is properly handled from the beginning of a case and can provide assistance with the instruction and selection of appropriate experts.

Gareth has experience in a wide range of areas and is confident dealing with complex causation issues, including the difficult area of consent.

Gareth has developed a particular interest in claims involving gynaecological injuries, urinary and bowel injuries including misdiagnosis, late diagnosis (including of cancer) and negligent surgery claims and is sensitive to the impact such injuries have, both physically and psychologically.

Gareth has significant experience of group litigation work relating to defect medical products, particularly gynaecological.  He is currently instructed by multiple claimants bringing claims against Johnson & Johnson and other manufacturers for injuries caused by transvaginal mesh (‘TVM’) devices and has recently obtained a Group Litigation Order on behalf of almost 200 women to pursue claims relating to the Essure contraceptive device manufactured by Bayer (Karen Louise Tonge and anor v Bayer Public Limited Company and anor [2023] EWHC 1792 (KB)).

Gareth’s commercial practice has a particular focus on consumer protection and environmental issues, including those involving European and competition law.  He is experienced in handling jurisdictional issues and claims involving foreign law.

He also has a particular interest and expertise in conspiracy, fraud, and consumer contract issues, as well as in telecommunications.  He has been retained as counsel for a major telecommunications company for over a decade and has conducted litigation on their behalf across the country.

Gareth was a member of the claimant counsel team in the Volkswagen NOx Emissions Litigation, instructing on behalf of almost 90,000 claimants, until that case settled in mid-2022.  He is now instructed by the claimants in the Mercedes NOx Emissions Litigation and is also instructed in claims against 13 other vehicle manufacturers, including Ford, Peugeot-Citroen, and Nissan/Renault.

Gareth has been instructed in most of the large group actions involved mass data breaches in recent years, including claims against Equifax, Ticketmaster, British Airways, the Police Federation of England and Wales, and proposed claims against easyJet and Arnold Clark.

He has significant experience of UK GDPR and DPA issues including dealing with complex data breaches, compensation issues (mainly in multi-party litigation, but also high value individual claims) and data rectification. He has advised on issues arising from companies using data-driven business models and has provided advice to businesses on questions of data retention and interpretation of the exemptions, particularly as they impact on medical and other public bodies.

Many of the cases Gareth has been instructed in involve cross-border issues including data sharing; the territorial scope of the GDPR; issues arising from Brexit; and jurisdiction.

Gareth has wide-ranging expertise in all manner of group litigation disputes, and has handled commercial, consumer, environmental, data protection and product liability actions all subject either to formal Group Litigation Orders or some other form of collective case management.

He has been ranked as a leading Junior in the Group Litigation category of Chambers and Partners since its inception three years ago.

Examples of his recent and ongoing cases include:

  • The Volkswagen NOx Emissions Litigation
  • The Mercedes NOx Emissions Litigation and the subsequent ‘Pan-NOx litigation against, among others, Ford, Citroen-Peugeot and Nissan/Renault
  • The JJML POP Products Litigation and the JJML SUI Products Litigation
  • The Essure Medical Products Litigation
  • Equifax data breach litigation
  • Ticketmaster data breach litigation

Gareth is instructed, mainly by claimants, in complex commercial and consumer product liability disputes.

He has significant experience of group litigation work in this sphere, especially relating to defective medical products, particularly gynaecological. He is currently instructed by multiple claimants in the JJML POP Products Litigation and the JJML SUI Products Litigation, bringing claims against Johnson & Johnson and other manufacturers for injuries caused by transvaginal mesh devices and has recently obtained a Group Litigation Order on behalf of almost 200 women to pursue claims relating to the Essure contraceptive device manufactured by Bayer.

He is also a leading Junior in the Dieselgate litigation, acting for hundreds of thousands of Claimants in diesel emissions claims.  He was instructed in both the initial claims brought against Volkswagen and in the second wave of litigation against Mercedes, Ford, Nissan/Renault and 10 other leading motor manufacturers.

Significant Cases


Crossley and others v Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft [2020] EWHC 873 (QB)


Crossley and others v Volkswagen Aktiengescellschaft [2021] EWHC 3444 (QB)


Collins v Ticketmaster UK Limited [2021] 10 WLUK 560


Neal Bennett and ors v Equifax Limited [2022] EWHC 1487 (QB)


Karen Louise Tongue v Bayer plc [2023] EWHC 1792 (KB)


Mark Allsop v Bayerische Moteren Werke Akteingesellschaft [2023] EWHC 2710 (KB)


Various Claimants v Mercedes Benz and others [2023] EWHC 3173 (KB)


Aurora Cavallari v Mercedes Benz [2024] EWHC 190 (KB)


Various Claimants v Mercedes Benz and others [2024] EWHC 695 (KB)

Privacy Policy

Gareth Shires Privacy Policy

My contact details:

ICO Reg No: Z1513133
Address: 2 Temple Gardens, London, EC4Y 9AY
Email: clerks@2tg.co.uk
Phone: +44 (0)20 7822 1200

The type of personal information I collect

To enable me to provide you with legal advice and representation in courts, tribunals, arbitrations and mediations, I currently collect and process the following personal information:

Personal identifiers, contacts and characteristics (for example, name, date of birth and contact details), bank and financial details, your background and circumstance and education.

Other personal data relevant to, or included in instructions to provide legal services, including data specific to the instructions in question and data included in documents provided to me as part of instructions or otherwise.

Such information may include personal information relating to family members, associates, agents, employees, shareholders or beneficial owners. By providing such personal information to me, you automatically confirm that you are authorised to do so. It is not reasonably practicable for me to provide the information set out in this Privacy Notice to those individuals. Accordingly, where appropriate, you are responsible for providing this information to any such individuals.

Where necessary, I may also need to process Special Category data about you including

  • racial or ethnic origin;
  • personal data revealing political opinions;
  • personal data revealing religious or philosophical beliefs;
  • personal data revealing trade union membership;
  • genetic data;
  • biometric data (where used for identification purposes);
  • data concerning health;
  • data concerning a person’s sex life; and
  • data concerning a person’s sexual orientation.

How I get the personal information and why I have it

Most of the personal information that I process is provided to me directly by you or via the professional you have instructed such as a solicitor or consultant or other professional adviser who instructs me on your behalf to provide legal services.

I use the information that you have given me in order to

  • provide legal services to you, my client, including the provision of legal advice and
  • representation in courts, tribunals, arbitrations, and mediations
  • keep accounting records and carry out office administration
  • take or defend legal or regulatory proceedings or to exercise a lien
  • respond to potential complaints or make complaints
  • check for potential conflicts of interest in relation to future potential cases
  • promote and market my services
  • carry out anti-money laundering and terrorist financing checks
  • train other barristers and pupils, and when providing work-shadowing opportunities
  • publish legal judgments and decisions of courts and tribunals as required or permitted by law.

I may share this information with

  • other professional advisers such as other legal professionals and consultant experts and other witnesses
  • courts and tribunals
  • the staff in my Chambers
  • prosecution authorities
  • pupils and mini pupils
  • lay clients
  • family and associates of the person whose personal information I am processing
  • in the event of complaints, the Head of Chambers, other individuals nominated by Chambers who deal with complaints, the Bar Standards Board, and the Legal Ombudsman
  • other regulatory authorities
  • current, past or prospective employers
  • education and examining bodies
  • business associates, professional advisers and trade bodies, e.g. the Bar Council
  • professional indemnity insurers or brokers
  • the general public in relation to the publication of legal judgments and decisions of courts and tribunals
  • If you have engaged other professional advisers to instruct me on your behalf on the matters on which I am providing legal services to you, I shall assume that I may disclose your personal information to them unless you tell me otherwise.
  • I may be required to provide your information to regulators, such as the Bar Standards Board, the Financial Conduct Authority or the Information Commissioner’s Office. In the case of the Information Commissioner’s Office, there is a risk that your information may lawfully be disclosed by them for the purpose of any other civil or criminal proceedings, without my consent or yours, which includes privileged information.
  • I may also be required to disclose your information to the police or intelligence services, where, acting in good faith, I consider it required and permitted by law.

Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the lawful basis I rely on for processing this information is

  • The processing is necessary for a contract I have with you, or because you have asked me to take specific steps before entering into a contract.
  • You are able to remove your consent at any time. You can do this by contacting me.
  • It may be necessary for me to share your personal data to comply with legal obligations to, for example, HMRC.

How I store your personal information

Your information is securely stored in Chambers or at my home. I use reasonable technical and organisational security measures such as password protection and encryption of computer generated data and keeping paper data secure to prevent personal information from being accidentally lost or destroyed, or used or accessed in an unauthorised way.

In this connection, Chambers, as data processor, acting on my behalf, will only process your personal data on my instructions and is subject to a duty of confidentiality.

The data will be held in line with any regulatory obligations and generally be kept for 6 years but may be 12 years, or longer where, for example, the case includes information relating to a minor, from the date of completion of instructions. At this point any further retention will be reviewed and the data will be marked for deletion or marked for retention for a further period.

All data will be securely deleted or securely shredded after this time without reference to you. I will store some of your information which I need to carry out conflict checks for the rest of my career. However, this is likely to be limited only to your name and contact details and the name of the case. It will not include any information that is “sensitive information” for GDPR purposes.

Your data protection rights

Under data protection law, you have rights including:

  • Your right of access – You have the right to ask me for copies of your personal information.
  • Your right to rectification – You have the right to ask me to rectify personal information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask me to complete information you think is incomplete.
  • Your right to erasure – You have the right to ask me to erase your personal information in certain circumstances.
  • Your right to restriction of processing – You have the right to ask me to restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances.
  • Your right to object to processing – You have the the right to object to the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances.
  • Your right to data portability – You have the right to ask that I transfer the personal information you gave us to another organisation, or to you, in certain circumstances.
  • You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights. If you make a request, I have one month to respond to you. Please contact me at 2 Temple Gardens, London, EC4Y 9AY or clerks@2tg.co.uk if you wish to make a request.

Transfer of your information outside the European Economic Area (EEA)

This privacy notice is of general application and as such it is not possible to state whether it will be necessary to transfer your information out of the EEA. If I do transfer your personal data I will use safeguards to ensure the data is fully protected as required by the UK Data Protection Regulations.

Changes to my Privacy Policy

From time to time, I may need to make chances to my privacy policy. If so, the changes will appear on my entry on the 2TG website.

Marketing

As above, I may share your personal data with Chambers who may in turn use that data to notify you by email, or post about an invitation to seminars and similar events. You may opt out of receiving any such marketing communications at any time by using the “unsubscribe” link in any emails. In relation to how Chambers uses such data, please see Chambers’ privacy policy. Other than sharing personal data with Chambers as described above, I will not share your information with any other third party for marketing purposes.

How to complain

If you have any concerns about my use of your personal information, you can make a complaint to me or to my Senior Clerk, Lee Tyler at 2 Temple Gardens, London, EC4Y 9AY or clerks@2tg.co.uk. You can also complain to the ICO if you are unhappy with how we have used your data.

The ICO’s address:

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Helpline number: 0303 123 1113
ICO website: https://www.ico.org.uk

© Briefed Ltd 2021. All Rights Reserved.

“Nobody is better informed than he is on emissions."


Chambers UK 2025

“He is incredibly knowledgeable and experienced in personal injury/medical claims and also group action work.”


Legal 500 2025

"Gareth is just brilliant.”


Chambers UK 2025

"He is the go-to person on the Dieselgate claims."


Chambers UK 2024

“Gareth is a genuine specialist in group actions.”


Chambers UK 2023

  • 2005 – 2007 Nottingham Law School
  • 2001 – 2004 Worcester College, University of Oxford

  • Personal Injury Bar Association
  • Northern Circuit Commercial Bar Association
  • Lincoln’s Inn

“Gareth works fantastically hard and he is very clever and user-friendly. He provides really good insight on group actions.” “He is the guru on emissions and has done a huge amount to bring those cases forward. Nobody is better informed than he is on emissions.” “Gareth is just brilliant. He is involved in more pieces of group litigation than any other barrister I know.”
Chambers UK 2025

“Gareth is very practical and quickly gets to the nub of the issue. He is incredibly knowledgeable and experienced in personal injury/medical claims and also group action work. He is a good advocate and skilled drafter.”
Legal 500 2025

“He is the go-to person on the Dieselgate claims.”
Chambers UK 2024

“Gareth is a genuine specialist in group actions.”
Chambers UK 2023

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