Calm leadership in high‑stakes disputes

Huw Wallis

Head of Disputes & Partner, Disputes

+44 (0) 20 3691 2072

hwallis@greenwoods.co.uk

Huw Wallis leads Greenwoods’ Disputes team and advises individuals and businesses involved in complex, high‑value disputes arising out of a variety of commercial issues, including historic tax‑driven arrangements.

Huw is regularly instructed where claims surface many years after the original arrangements were entered into, often involving the nature or conditions around any alleged repayment obligations, enforceability and personal liability following changes in ownership or the assignment of rights. His work spans both tax‑related litigation and wider commercial recovery claims, acting for claimants and defendants.

Clients value Huw’s ability to take technically complex and emotionally charged issues and translate them into clear, pragmatic advice, focused on risk, commercial leverage and cost mitigation. He is frequently brought in where disputes have developed over time, documentation is historic or incomplete, and strategic oversight is required.

Huw has led multiple multi‑million‑pound disputes involving challenges to, and enforcement of, tax‑efficient investment schemes. His experience includes representing entities across a number of proceedings before the First‑tier Tax Tribunal and on appeal.

Most recently, Huw acted for a group of entities controlled by a private wealth adviser in a series of appeals against HMRC closure notices. The appeals concerned HMRC’s disallowance of capital allowances in relation to the construction and operation of bioethanol fuel plants in the UK and the United States. The issues required detailed analysis of how the schemes were structured, how alleged benefits were said to arise, and whether the activities in question were carried on for genuine commercial purposes.

Greenwoods has also acted on a lead appeal concerning tax schemes relating to the exploitation of film rights in the UK, raising complex and developing issues around the definition of “trading” in light of recent Supreme Court and Court of Appeal authority. Huw has further advised on disputes involving tax‑relief investment schemes connected with overseas property developments, including litigation progressing through the Upper Tribunal, with permission ultimately refused by the Court of Appeal.