Garden Court North Chambers (The Chambers of Ian Macdonald QC), formed in 1996, is a progressive set of barristers dedicated to providing a high-quality service to all clients, particularly those disadvantaged by discrimination and inequality.

Considered to be "the only noteworthy civil liberties outfit outside London" (Chambers and Partners 2005 p1626), and "...the only set outside London to specialise in human rights" (Chambers and Partners 2008), chambers has always had a strong commitment to publicly funded work. Members use their skills to articulate the arguments that their lay-clients would if they could and seek to ensure that in whatever forum they are operating, they uphold the legal rights of their clients to the maximum extent.

Chambers undertakes work in Criminal Defence  , Housing  , Immigration and Nationality  , Individual Rights and Civil Work  (including Judicial Review ), claims against the police  and Public authorities,Employment and Discrimination  law, Inquests , Prisoners' Rights , Community Care , Mental Health , and Education law . Most members of Chambers live in or around Manchester, although they frequently travel to court locations across England and Wales including London. Members of Chambers are prepared to undertake work pro bono in appropriate cases where funding is unavailable.

Equality

Chambers applies an equality code in relation to all of its activities, and opposes discrimination on the basis of, inter alia, sex, race, disability, religion, age or sexuality.

A compilation of our Diversity Data is available upon request from the Diversity Data Officer via clerks@gcnchambers.co.uk .

Legal Training

Chambers are approved as an external course provider by The Law Society to provide continuing professional development (CPD) training in our specialist areas. Chambers have been involved since February 2002 in North West Solicitors' Training with the regional Law Society. Members of Chambers regularly train solicitors, law centres and other professional bodies in specialist areas of law.

Premises

We moved to our current premises in Oxford Court in October 2002. Our facilities include client parking, spacious conference rooms and networked IT systems. Our chambers also feature disabled access facilities including a ground floor disabled toilet and disabled access to the ground floor conference room.

Client care

Chambers is proud to make client care the cornerstone of its practice. The standards charter  sets out the procedures we have implemented to that end.