Howard Cornes

Howard joined Harper James as a senior construction solicitor in 2021.

Howard has over 20 years of experience practising as a solicitor specialising in Construction and Engineering law.

Since qualifying in 1999, Howard has been a partner in an international firm of solicitors and the in-house head of legal for two large contractors and developers.

He has a number of reported cases decided in the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords that are now the leading authorities on the points of law that were in issue. He also has 23 years prior experience practising as a Chartered Building Surveyor and Chartered Builder working both in private practice and for contractors. He therefore has considerable knowledge and experience of both the construction industry and the applicable law to which it relates.

Howard specilises in both contentious and non-contentious construction work.

Howard’s contentious and ADR work encompasses:

Adjudication, litigation, enforcement proceedings, injunctive relief, arbitration and mediation.  To date, he has conducted over 200 adjudications on the behalf of contractors, sub-contractors and consultants since the process first incepted under HGCRA’96. 

His non-contentious experience encompasses: 

Drafting and negotiating main contracts, sub-contracts, professional appointments, collateral warranties, novation agreements, guarantees, performance bonds, deeds of assignment, letters of intent, maximum price agreements, option agreements and licences, etc.

He has experience of all the major standard form contracts including JCT, ICE, FIDIC, NEC and IChemE.

In addition to the experience he has working within the construction and engineering industry, Howard has also has experience working within the petro-chemical engineering, power generation and renewable energy sectors.

In his spare time Howard is a keen golfer, who also enjoys the gym, cycling, playing the guitar (badly) and doing the occasional track day.