Madeleine Jones

Madeleine has experience acting for and advising companies, creditors and office-holders in a wide range of applications within corporate and individual insolvency proceedings.  She is equally at home working on technical insolvency law questions, including relating to cross-border matters, and fact-heavy disputes involving allegations of wrongdoing.

Examples of current and recent work:

• Acting as sole counsel for a creditor in a challenge to an individual voluntary arrangement under s. 262 IA 1986, listed for a 4 day trial.
• Acting as sole counsel for a respondent to applications for transactions at an undervalue, preferences and misfeasance under s. 212, 238 and 239 IA 86, listed for a 7 day trial.
• Advising a foreign liquidator in relation to obtaining information and disclosure with the assistance of the English courts.
• Advising a foreign liquidator on English law contracts and the impact of the foreign liquidation under English law.
• Advising and acting as junior counsel for a company in an application to restrain advertisement of a winding up petition on the basis of a dispute relating to the application of insolvency set-off to contingent liabilities under a complex set of contracts.
• Acting for respondents in a transaction at an undervalue claim relating to a share transfer (settled achieved prior to trial).
• Advising directors in relation to an application under s. 235 IA 1986 to provide assistance to an office-holder.
• Advising a director in relation to an application under s. 212 of the IA 1986 relating to participation in a tax scheme.
• Acting as junior counsel for the liquidators in an application under s. 212 of the IA 1986 in a claim relating to share trading.
• Acting for a trustee in bankruptcy in an application for a declaration of ownership over property subject to an allegedly sham trust deed.
• Obtaining an administration order with retrospective effect where an administration was accidentally allowed to lapse prior to the sale of a major asset.
• Successful defence of a winding up petition based on a judgment debt which the company proposed to dispute in further proceedings.
• Acting for a creditor in obtaining an administration order over an English holding company for a well-known and high value business without notice to the company directors where fraud was alleged.
• Various advisory work for individual and corporate creditors: advising a high-value creditor on challenge to an individual voluntary arrangement, advising a creditor relying on a contract in need of rectification in negotiations with a debtor, advising a high value creditor on issues relating to jurisdiction in proposed bankruptcy proceedings.
• Various advisory work for directors accused of wrongdoing: advising a director in relation to an alleged preference.

Reported cases include:

• Poundland Limited [2025] EWHC 1822 (Ch) – acting for the company in a high profile restructuring plan; led by Tom Smith KC and Georgina Peters.
• Light SA [2024] EWHC 2733 (Ch) – acting for the company (a Brazilian utilities company) in a scheme of arrangement raising cross-border jurisdictional issues; led by Tom Smith KC.
• Project Lietzenburger Strasse Holdco Sarl (“Aggregate”) [2024] EWHC 468 (Ch), [2024] EWHC 563 (Ch) – acting for an opposing creditor in relation to a Part 26A scheme; led by Charlotte Cooke.
• Hex Technologies Ltd v DCBX Ltd [2023] EWHC 537 (Ch) – acting for the creditors in a disputed bankruptcy petition. Judgment dealt with whether a debt based on contract containing a foreign jurisdiction clause can be the basis of a petition (as with Al Kuwari v Cantervale).
• Al Kuwari v Cantervale Ltd [2022] EWHC 3490 (Ch) – acting for the creditor in an application to set aside a statutory demand in bankruptcy. Judgment dealt with whether a debt based on contract containing a foreign jurisdiction clause can be the basis of a
• Oyston v Rubin [2020] EWHC 1726 (Ch), [2021] EWHC 448 (Ch), [2021] EWHC 1120 (Ch) –
• acting for court-appointed receivers in a challenge to their account in a complex and high- value receivership; led by Mark Phillips KC.
• Re Carluccio’s Limited [2020] EWHC 886 (Ch) – directions application by the Carluccio’s administrators on the treatment of the Government Job Retention Scheme in administration; led by Felicity Toube KC.
• Discovery (Northampton) Ltd v Debenhams Retail Ltd [2019] EWHC 2441 (Ch) – the Debenhams CVA challenge; acting for the Company led by Tom Smith KC and Richard Fisher
• Bhogal v Knight [2018] EWHC 2952 (Ch) – on costs in a successful challenge to an IVA supervisor’s rejection of a claim.

She has experience in various applications under the Insolvency Act 1986 and the Insolvency Rules 2016 including the following:

• Part 26 schemes and Part 26A restructuring plans.
• Applications relating to winding up petitions, including injunctions to restrain presentation or advertisement of winding up petitions, hearings to determine whether a petition is disputed in good faith on substantial grounds and just and equitable winding up;
• All stages of the bankruptcy petition process, including applications to set aside statutory demands and disputed debt petition hearings;
• Creditors’ challenges to decisions of office-holders, the chair of IVA and CVA meetings and IVA and CVA supervisors;
• Office-holder actions against delinquent directors (ss. 212, 213, and 214 IA 1986);
• Transactions at an undervalue and preferences (ss. 238, 239 and 423 of IA 1986);
• Office-holder applications for information and examination (ss. 235-237 IA 1986);
• Applications under the CBIR;
• Administration applications and extensions.

Madeleine has advised on various issues arising within the financial services sector both in an insolvency context and otherwise, including guarantees, debt securitisation, intermediation of securities, the construction of ISDA Master Agreements and other financial services contracts, and regulatory issues.

She has also been instructed as junior counsel in a high value swaps dispute.

Madeleine often drafts statements of case and appears as sole counsel in contractual disputes in the County Court. She has also appeared sole counsel in High Court proceedings, and has a good knowledge of the procedural steps necessary to take a case to trial.  She has experience of cross-examining witnesses and trial.

Madeleine has experience advising on and acting in various company law applications, including unfair prejudice petitions, claims for unpaid dividends, claims against directors for breach of duty, applications to register company charges out of time and restoration applications.

Recent work includes:

• Acting for the petitioner in an unfair prejudice petition.
• Obtaining an amendment to the companies register to remove confidential information at short notice.
• Various advisory work: Advising on the impact of the reflective loss principle in a prospective claim against company directors, advising a minority shareholder on unfair prejudice and just and equitable remedies, strategic advice over a period to a heavily invested shareholder and creditor on dealing with a balance sheet insolvent company.

Madeleine has been instructed in matters relating to fraud both as sole counsel and as junior counsel in insolvency proceedings (claims by office-holders against former directors) and in general commercial proceedings (misrepresentation).

She has been instructed on numerous occasions to advise on and assist with asset recovery, and she has experience in applications for charging orders (both straightforward and disputed) and third party debt orders. She is able to advise on all means of civil recovery and enforcement of judgments.

She also has experience advising and drafting in relation to transactions at an undervalue and preferences including in contexts where fraud is suspected.

Current and recent works includes:

• Acting as sole counsel for a respondent to applications for transactions at an undervalue, preferences and misfeasance under s. 212, 238 and 239 IA 86, listed for a 7 day trial.
• Acting for respondents in a transaction at an undervalue claim relating to a share transfer (settled achieved prior to trial).
• Advising a director in relation to an application under s. 212 of the IA 1986 relating to participation in a tax scheme.
• Acting as junior counsel for the liquidators in an application under s. 212 of the IA 1986 in a claim relating to share trading.
• Applications for charging orders.

In practice Madeleine has undertaken advisory work relating to offshore matters. She has advised on insolvency and bankruptcy law matters under the law of the DIFC, Hong Kong, Jersey and various Caribbean jurisdictions. She has also advised on aspects of some high value trusts litigation in Jersey.

2026 Chambers & Partners – Band 5 – UK Bar – Restructuring & Insolvency

2026 Legal500 – Leading Junior, Band 4 – UK Bar – Insolvency

Member of ILA Associates Committee

Insolvency and Economic Disaster, with Sir William Trower and Mark Phillips KC, in Law at the Cutting Edge: Essays in honour of Sarah Worthington, Hart Publishing, 2024

Journal of International Banking and Finance Law, 2021, Limited Recourse Lending

Journal of International Banking and Finance Law 2018, Insolvency Set-Off and Secured Debts

INSOL International Newsletter 2018, Banks’ liability for fraudulent withdrawals by authorised individuals (first published in the South Square Digest, May 2018)

LexisNexis Practice Note 2017, Part 14 of the Insolvency Rules 2016: Claims by and distributions to creditors

International Corporate Rescue 2017, 2018, Various case-law updates

Contributor to:

Nolan and Smith on Company Voluntary Arrangements (Oxford University Press), 2023

Rowlatt on Principal and Surety (Sweet & Maxwell) 7^th edition, 2018

Lightman and Moss on the Law of Administrators and Receivers of Companies (Sweet & Maxwell) 6^th edition, 2017

European Cross Border Insolvency (Sweet & Maxwell) 2017

City University, London, Bar Professional Training Course

City University, London, Graduate Diploma in Law

Princeton University, PhD Classical Philology (Roman literature and philosophy)

University of Cambridge, St John’s College, MPhil Classics (Distinction)

University of Cambridge, St John’s College, BA Classics (Double first class; fourth in year)

Bradford Girls’ Grammar School

Bedingfield Scholarship, Gray’s Inn

David Karmel Award, Gray’s Inn

Thomas F Curley Memorial Fund Fellowship, Princeton University

Cotsen Junior Teaching Fellowship, Princeton University

Perkins Prize, Princeton University

Hawksley-Burbury Prize, St John’s College, University of Cambridge

Henry Arthur Thomas Award, St John’s College, University of Cambridge

College Prize, St John’s College, University of Cambridge

Wright Prize, St John’s College, University of Cambridge