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The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. – judgment due

The High Court will give its judgment tomorrow on the petition of The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. to be compulsorily wound up in Ireland.

McGarr Solicitors opposed the application before the High Court (the only firm of solicitors, representing Harley PIP breast implant victims, to do so).

Judgment will be handed down in Crt No. 3 in the Four Courts at 2.00 pm.

To attend the event, (which will last 10 minutes at most) enter the Four Courts through the front door (with the big pillars) and, in the Round Hall, immediately turn left to see the door to Court 3.

Harley Medical Group – Did you get this notice?

RULE 4.228 OF THE INSOLVENCY RULES 1986

NOTICE TO THE CREDITORS OF AN INSOLVENT COMPANY OF THE RE-USE OF A PROHIBITED NAME

THE HARLEY MEDICAL CENTRE LIMITED
(Company Number 01728619)
I, Melvin Braham, of 11 Queen Anne Street, London W1G 9LJ was a Director of the above named company on the day it went into administration. I give notice that I am acting and intend to continue to act in one or more of the ways to which Section 216(3) of the Insolvency Act 1986, would apply if the above-maned Company were to go into insolvent liquidation connection with or for the purposes of, the carrying on of the whole or substantially the whole of the business of the above-named Company under the following name: Aesthetic and Cosmetic Surgery Limited trading as the Harley Medical Group

Did you receive a notice from Mr. Melvin Braham, Mr. Pierre Guillot or Ms. Louise Braham, in the terms set out above?

Are you an Irish client of The Harley Medical Group, with PIP breast implants?

What is this notice, you ask?

Read on.

The Insolvency Rules

Under the Rules contained in the UK Insolvency (Amendment) Rules 2007, directors of companies such as The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. are obliged to publish a prescribed notice in the London Gazette

    and

to notify every creditor of the company whose name and address is known [to the director] or is ascertainable by him on the making of such enquiries as are reasonable in the circumstances.

The Harley Medical Group was a trade mark of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. of 11 Queen Anne St. in London.

The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. went into administration in the UK on 9th November 2012. The administrators sold some or all of the business of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. to another company, Aesthetic and Cosmetic Surgery Ltd.

The “Harley” Notice

On 7th December 2012, Mr. Melvin Braham, Mr. Pierre Guillot and Ms. Louise Braham, all directors of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. and also directors of Aesthetic and Cosmetic Surgery Ltd., published a notice in the London Gazette in the form seen HERE.

The Liquidation of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd t/a The Harley Medical Group

Subsequently, as it happened, The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. went into insolvent liquidation. (It also changed its name to THMC Realisations (2012) Ltd.)

Clearly, the “Harley” notice was intended to comply with the terms of the UK Insolvency (Amendment) Rules 2007 (seen HERE).

Did you receive the “Harley” notice?

McGarr Solicitors would like to hear from every Irish client of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. to check the extent of compliance of Mr. Melvin Braham, Mr. Pierre Guillot and Ms. Louise Braham with the UK Insolvency (Amendment) Rules 2007.

EMAIL US!

We look forward to hearing from you by email at [email protected]

The Harley Medical Group: Who are they, really?

Harley Medical GroupIn the UK and Ireland, The Harley Medical Centre Ltd., trading as The Harley Medical Group, was a major seller and distributor of the defective PIP breast implants. The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd is currently before the Irish courts, looking to be put into liquidation. McGarr Solicitors is the only solicitors’ firm that has attended court for Irish PIP victims and argued for their clients’ interests in this application.

The Crime

    1. The PIP criminal trial is currently at hearing in France.
    2. McGarr solicitors act for a number of women victims of the PIP scandal. The scandal was the distribution and sale of sub-standard silicone breast implants. This post is a partial explanation of the current position of Irish PIP victims and related Irish legal activities.

The Harley Liquidation

    1. The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. went into administration and then liquidation (and changed its name). This has all happened in the UK under the insolvency law of that jurisdiction.
    2. The administrator promptly sold the business to, it appears, the shareholders of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. and they have continued the business in the same premises using a new company. That company is continuing the use of the trade name The Harley Medical Group. Its directors are the defunct directors of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd.
    3. There was an exception to the plan; the exception was in Dublin. The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. had a clinic at 5 Herbert Place in Dublin 2. We know this because it said so on its website. There was and is a plaque, effectively saying so, attached to the wall outside 5 Herbert Place. In addition, the contracts signed by Irish Harley customers stated that the contract was with The Harley Medical Centre Ltd.
    4. It now appears that the leasehold interest in 5 Herbert Place Dublin 2 was held by another company, The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. Despite its name, this company was formed and registered in the British Virgin Islands.

The Harley Medical Group Dublin Liquidation

    1. Now, this company also wishes to be liquidated. It had directors in common with The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. In other words, the two managements were the same.
    2. It has chosen to apply for liquidation in Ireland, in the Irish High Court. In doing so it has claimed, in sworn testimony, that it is the entity that carried on the medical business conducted at 5 Herbert St. Dublin 2.
    3. This is confusing. It also creates uncertainty; uncertainty as to the identity of the corporate body answerable to Irish Harley PIP victims.
    4. Because The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. made this claim to the High Court, the court directed that McGarr Solicitors (and other firms also) be put on notice of the petition to wind up The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. McGarr Solicitors act for a number of Irish Harley PIP victims.

The Opposition to the Harley Dublin Liquidation

  1. McGarr Solicitors have opposed the making of a winding up order for The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd.
  2. In the UK, persons such as Harley PIP victims may, under UK law, apply to enforce their claims against any relevant insurance company carrying the Harley risk. This is not the case in Ireland.
  3. So, if there is insurance cover for claims such as the PIP claims, and if each victim can prove damage and loss, it would be important to be able to make a claim against that insurer of Harley.
  4. But which Harley would be the insured Harley? This question illustrates the damaging effect of the claim of The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. Its claim that it is the company that sold and fitted defective breast implants to Irish women at least potentially undermines the right of those women to claim against the UK insurer of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd.
  5. As it happens, the claimed, indeed assumed, “right” of The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. to be wound up by the Irish courts is not obvious. It is not obvious because Irish law includes EU law and under the relevant EU law the available evidence shows that the place where The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. might more properly be liquidated is the UK and not Ireland.
  6. The available evidence shows, for instance, that the headed notepaper of The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. recited that it had nineteen clinics, eighteen of which were in the UK. Oddly, they appear to be the same clinics that The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. had.
  7. As it further happened, the lawyers for The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd., in submitting the petition to wind up The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. denied that the EU insolvency regulation applied to The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. and its petition. McGarr Solicitors disagree. We say the Regulation applies. We say that the available evidence establishes where the “centre of main interests” (“COMI”) for The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. is, and its COMI is in the UK. Consequently, we say, the Irish high court does not have jurisdiction to wind up The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. in “main proceedings”. That privilege lies with the UK courts. (Consequently, Irish PIP victims would then have the benefit of UK law and would be able to press any necessary claims against the insurance companies of The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. as well as the claims against the insurers of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd.).
  8. These are the questions now being decided by the Irish High court. Judgment is expected in about a week.
  9. Meanwhile, we are continuing our investigations of the insurance cover bought by The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. We are doing this through correspondence with the liquidator of The Harley Medical Centre Ltd. Currently we believe that company was insured against claims such as those of Irish PIP victims. We have identified what we believe is the policy and the insurer that carried that risk

Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd liquidation application

 

Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Limited is a company registered in the British Virgin Islands.

About a month ago, we were notified by McCann Fitzgerald, solicitors for the Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Limited of their client’s application to the High Court in Dublin seeking to wind up the company.

As solicitors representing women suffering as a result of having been supplied with faulty PIP breast implants by the Harley Medical Group, we were made notice parties to that application at the direction of Judge Laffoy in March.

Today and last week we were the only solicitors for PIP recipients who turned up to represent their clients in the hearing of this application.

Our counsel argued that the Centre of Main Interests (called the COMI) of the company was not in Ireland and was probably in the UK. He also argued that the Harley British Virgin Islands company had failed to take account of the EU’s Insolvency Regulation in applying for a winding up in Ireland.

He cited, as evidence of our contention that the real COMI was the UK, the fact that the Harley Medical Group used the year of establishment of the UK company on its brass plaque at its Dublin office, that the contracts with its patients cited the UK company as the contracting party and that the UK website cited Dublin as just one of 19 clinics, with all the rest being in the UK.

This is significant because, if we are successful in our argument, Harley’s application to be wound up in Ireland will be declined and, logically, the Harley company should seek to be wound up in the UK instead. That would be of benefit to PIP victims, because the UK has laws allowing injured parties to directly sue the insurance companies of liquidated companies for compensation.

At the end of our submissions, counsel for Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd made some short points in response, acknowledging he was answering a tightly argued legal case.

The Judge reserved judgment, which is expected within the next two weeks.

The Harley Medical Group and PIP victims’ claims

Harley Medical Group
Currently, in Court 3 in the Round Hall of the Four Courts, a company called The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd (“The Company”) is appearing before the High Court seeking to be wound up. The company is registered in the British Virgin Islands, with an office in Ireland at 5 Herbert Place.

This is not the first time this matter has been before the Court. In March Ms. Justice Laffoy ordered that a number of parties- including our office- be put on notice of the application. In addition, further details of the company’s insurance arrangements were to be furnished.

PIP Victims

We were placed on notice because we represent a group of women who were customers of the Harley Medical Group and received faulty breast implants made by a French company called PIP. The implants were made with industrial grade silicone (apparently intended, by the silicone factory, to fill mattresses, amongst other things) rather than the medical grade silicone  of which they were held out to be made.

After receiving a copy of the petition to wind up The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. (and other papers) we requested details of its insurance arrangements. To date we have not received the full complement of relevant insurance documents.

In the absence of the relevant documents it is not possible for us to definitively say that The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. was not insured for claims such as those of PIP victims.

Likewise, it is not possible for The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. to claim that it has demonstrated that it was not so insured.

Harley Medical Group Insurance

Insurance cover by The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. (and its UK associated company, The Harley Medical Centre Ltd.) for PIP claims (and the enforcement of such cover) is important for PIP victims. It would greatly ease the enforcement of PIP victims’ claims (and the recovery of compensation after the conclusion of litigation for the PIP victims injuries and losses).

It is important to know this:

a) enforcement of the PIP claims is done by each PIP victim;

b) enforcement of the Harley insurance cover is done by the relevant Harley company;

Even in the absence of all the relevant insurance documentation we believe that The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. had applicable insurance cover for PIP type claims for the year 2005/2006. It is very likely that such cover was in place for other years, possibly extending right up to March 2010, at which time The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. officially learned of the PIP scandal.

The winding up petition is being opposed by us on the ground that The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd. has its Centre of Main Interest in the UK (and should be wound up there).

The hearing of the petition commenced on 22nd April 2013 and will continue next Monday (29th April 2013) on which date the documents and supporting legal authorities opposing the granting of the petition will be opened to the court.

The Data Protection Acts aim to make us the Author of our own life

A pencil is a communication tool

Just a quiet little note about Data Protection- a subject I frequently refer to but haven’t addressed directly.

Usually, any mention I do make about Data Protection is concerned with how to use the Acts as a tool to extract information you want. The legislation is certainly useful for that- though after a decade of using them, Data Access Requests still seem to arrive as a shock to their recipients. But it’s worth remembering that those tools were created in the service of a principle.

That principle is pretty straightforward: You are an autonomous person, deserving of respect and dignity. You are not a commodity to be bought, sold or traded without consent. And, if we accept that information about ourselves- our reputation- is a part of who we are, then it follows that ought not to be commoditised either.

That statement of principle needs to be restated and reinforced whenever it can be. It requires us all to take on quite a lot of responsibility for ourselves. If we’re to be asked how we’re willing to allow our data to be used- as opposed to allowing companies to trade it how they like, without us even knowing- we can expect to have to make a lot more decisions.

That pressure of being asked to make decisions over and over again in a week takes a toll. Barack Obama buys multiple identical suits and alternates wearing them just to avoid having to make an extra decision in his day.

But if we’re going to hold to the core principle of Data Protection- that we are the owners of the stories of our lives- we’re going to have to get used to deciding what we want that story to be and who we want to share it with.

And I think we should appreciate anything that recognises we have a right to be the author of our own lives.

Do the National Newspapers of Ireland (NNI) know who they are?

A while ago I wrote to Mr. Frank Cullen trading as National Newspapers of Ireland, seeking to make a Data Subject Access Request.

I have recieved a response to that request on NNI headed paper (albeit one which will be the subject of future correspondence).

However, as part of that response came the following assertion;

“Your access request was addressed to “Mr Frank Cullen trading as National Newspapers of Ireland”. Please note that Mr. Cullen does not “trade as” National Newspapers of Ireland.”

I found this a mysterious statement. After all, if you do a search in the Companies Registration Office you find that the National Newspapers of Ireland is not a company registered with the Irish CRO. And their own headed paper on which that assertion was printed doesn’t cite any body corporate for the NNI.

However, the Companies Registration Office search does reveal that the National Newspapers of Ireland (NNI) is a registered trading name of an individual- Mr. Francis Malachy Cullen. You may see a copy of this printout below.

If “Mr. Cullen does not “trade as” National Newspapers of Ireland” as the letter states, who does?

 

Business Name Printout for National Newspapers of Ireland (NNI) by Simon McGarr

Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd seek winding up over implant claims

The Harley Medical Group, 5 Herbert Place

 

Tomorrow, the 8th April, in Court 3 in the Round Hall of the Four Courts, a company called Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd (“The Company”) is appearing before the High Court seeking to be wound up. The company is registered in the British Virgin Islands, with an office in Ireland at 5 Herbert Place.

This is the second time this matter has been before the Court. In March Ms. Justice Laffoy ordered that a number of parties- including our office- be put on notice of the application. In addition, further details of the company’s insurance arrangements were to be furnished.

We were placed on notice because we represent a group of women who were customers of the Harley Medical Group and received faulty breast implants made by a French company called PIP. The implants were made with industrial grade silicone (apparently intended, amongst other things, to fill mattresses) rather than the medical grade silicone which they were held out to be.

After receiving a copy of the Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd’s affidavit seeking the winding-up, our office wrote to the Company and requested details of their insurance arrangements. A supplementary affidavit was delivered by email to our office at approximately 5pm on Friday, 5th April..

We will be making response on behalf of our clients in this matter in court on Monday.

However the State also has questions to answer in this matter.

The Chief Medical Officer

On the 3rd July 2012, Dr. Tony Holohan, the State’s Chief Medical Officer issued a statement.

“Despite intense discussions with and ongoing and clear pressure from the CMO’s Office in relation to one provider, the Harley Medical Group, that provider has failed to provide an appropriate care package for its clients. The Department is not satisfied that the Harley Medical Group will fulfil their obligations in an acceptable manner”

He went on to assure the women affected by this failure that the state would not leave them without access to affordable medical attention.

“it has been decided that necessary care required by the affected recipients of these implants should be made available via an alternative route, i.e. the NTPF.”

However, despite mention of a September date for the details of this provision to be published, the National Treatment Purchase Fund website makes no mention of any such care package. In addition, none of our clients have been contacted with the details of any National Treatment Purchase Fund provision for their medical needs.

It appears that, eight months from the declared date when a solution would be published and ten months from when it was announced, nothing has actually happened.

Irish Medicines Board

Furthermore, the advice and information issued by the Irish Medicines Board -who are responsible for the regulation of medical devices such as implants in Ireland- on the issue of PIP implants have been incomplete to the point of being misleading. The IMB has consistently sought to minimise the data relating to the real and quantifiable risk to women who have been implanted with PIP silicone.

In July 2012, the Irish Medicines Board issued a statement in response to the most comprehensive study of the evidence of risk from PIP implants to date. That study was done by an expert group for the NHS. You can read the data amassed in that report here.

That data showed that

  • PIP Breast Implants were up to six times as likely to rupture as standard implants.
  • The expert group were projecting up to 30% failure rate by 10 years for PIP implants.
  • Furthermore, the NHS studied records of women who had had both normal and PIP breast implants removed. It found that women with PIP Implants were 4.6 times as likely to have inflammation and/or lymphadenopathy than women with normal implants. They were 23.3 times as likely to present with lymphadenopathy alone.

Here’s how the Irish Medicines Board described the findings of this report in February 2013

“The Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in the UK publishing the final test results for PIP breast implants. The report concluded ‘that the silicone contained in PIP breast implants does not pose a risk to human health’.”

The Irish Medicines Board has never made any mention of the reported increased rupture risk, and, despite having noted the publication of the NHS report, made no reference to the evidence it demonstrated of increased risks of lymphadenopathy and/or inflammation. We have had women who have contacted our office in the year since that report was with the IMB, describing the symptoms of lymph node inflammation who had been unaware of the established connection with PIP implants.

As late as July 2012 the Chief Medical Officer was still ending his public statement on PIP implants with an assertion that “the risk of rupture is low”.

On Monday the 8th April The Harley Medical Group (Ireland) Ltd will be returning before Ms. Justice Laffoy to provide her with further information. We will be there to represent our clients.

However, we also know that it is our clients’ wishes that the State should keep its promises and take seriously its duties to inform and assist all the women caught up  in this scandal.

A Car Accident, Solicitors and the common good

Modern people, sportsmen/women excepted, are most at risk of serious injury when travelling on the road. The energy bundled in a motor car, or other vehicle, is considerable. If that energy is suddenly blocked, which is what happens in a typical car accident, it must go somewhere and, unfortunately, it sometimes goes into us. Then you are injured and the nature and extent of that injury is determined by chance.

Make no mistake; as a society, we have planned these accidents. Otherwise we would prohibit such forms of travel. Instead, we build lots of roads and we promote the use and sale of motor cars.

In this sense, it is a misnomer, to call these events “accidents”.

Take a circus, or theatre, knife-thrower.  If the knife thrower “accidentally” throws the knife and stabs his (typically) lovely assistant in the heart, we expect that the police will arrest him and that he will be convicted of a crime. We reject the idea that this is an accident. His implied position, that his only fault lies in that last unintended lapse in his wrist, is rejected.

We know that he arranged everything and we are reasonable in considering that, perhaps, or even probably, he had no lapse whatever in his wrist and intended the injury/death.

It is, among other things, this knowledge of a social responsibility for road traffic accidents that we see expressed in the fact of a Government “4th Road Safety Strategy” or that the EU is holding a “Road Transport Safety Conference on Serious Injuries” in Dublin.

It is a fact, and we should know it, that, as a society, we can suffer mental aberration on these matters. (“Mental aberration” is a polite term for madness).

I do not just mean politicians’ proposals for Irish farmers to be permitted to drink and drive.

I do not just mean politicians claiming that workers allegedly neglecting road safety be allowed to get on with the job and be freed from “red tape”.

I mean it is a form of mental illness, hypocrisy certainly, to plan for injuries to happen and to claim, in the Constitution, that the State will vindicate the person (meaning bodily integrity) of citizens (and others) and then to establish a statutory body (the Injuries Board, a.k.a., the Personal Injuries Assessment Board) (and maintain it) that seeks to ensure the lowest possible level of success in delivering compensation to those injured persons, and to go further; to shrink the window of opportunity for the injured person to effectively make a claim for that compensation to the inadequate time of two years.

In fact, to term all of this “madness” is politeness.

We should remember that we were not always as “mad” as we currently are. We have a “legal system” that includes a cohort of persons intent on overcoming the State’s lunacy.When it comes to car accidents solicitors (and barristers) are those working for the common good. The persons who intentionally hobbled them in doing what they try to do, namely, vindicate the bodily integrity of road accident and other personal injury victims, cannot be categorised as mad. They are simply working against the common good.

Work Accidents and reading newspapers

Work can be dangerous.

According to a newspaper report, Cork County Council workers were working on the public road in hazardous circumstances. They had, allegedly, created the hazard for themselves and passing traffic. Their superiors were, reportedly, upset to hear of the incident. Any such upset is understandable for a number of reasons.

Road repair is a work of civil engineering and is regulated by the Construction Regulations 2006. Planning and correctly executing construction or engineering works is important. The Health and Safety Authority emphasises this on its website.

We know what can happen at the scene of Irish road repairs. Five schoolgirls were killed when their bus crashed at roadworks near Kentstown, Co Meath, in 2005.

It is the obligation of a County Council (and of its individual workers) to ensure the safety of workers, and the general public, at work sites. Breaches of these duties give rise to possible criminal prosecution and, in the case of injury, to claims for damages.

Judging by the newspaper report, among the elected members of Cork County, these obligations are controversial; they get in the way of work and the application of “common sense”.

Reading newspapers can be dangerous to health also.

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