Thompsons has been fighting for the injured and mistreated for over a century, using the law to keep people safe and change lives for the better. 

Leading civil rights lawyer, Harry Thompson, established Thompsons Solicitors in 1921 with a vision to use the law to provide protection for working people. Today, that vision lives on in our expert litigation teams who together form the most experienced personal injury and employment practice in the UK.

Throughout our history, we have been involved in every major fight against unfair working practices - and we are still doing it today.

Read our history in full here.

 

Why choose Thompsons Solicitors? 

Unlike other personal injury law firms, we’re 100 per cent committed to claimant-only work. We only ever use our unique experience to represent the injured or mistreated.  We never act for those who cause or pay out for injury - employers or insurers

You can learn more about this commitment and the benefits it holds for our clients by reading our pledge.

 

 

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Our People

Our team of personal injury specialists are recognised by legal law journals as experts in their field and secure millions of pounds in personal injury compensation each year.

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Our Offices

We have a comprehensive network of offices, allowing us to combine regional knowledge and specialist, national expertise.

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Our Pledge

Learn more about the Thompsons Pledge and our unique commitment to injured and mistreated people.

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Careers

Thompsons offers a distinctive approach to career development alongside the opportunity to support thousands of injured people on their journey to recovery each year.

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Our 100-year history

 

  • 1921

    William Henry 'Harry' Thompson founds Thompsons Solicitors.

  • 1921

    The Local Authorities (Financial Provisions) Act 1921 is rushed through parliament after Thompsons acts for Labour councillors in the Poplar Rates Rebellion, a protest against the poorest boroughs of London paying the same tax as the richest.

     

  • 1926

    In an early precursor to the concept of equal pay for work of equal value, Thompsons represents Poplar Borough Council in a wage dispute (primarily about women’s pay), after the councillors increased minimum rates of pay to £4 per week regardless of the work done or the person doing it. The case is ultimately lost and the council has to pay penalties.

  • 1926

    Thompsons works tirelessly to support miners and other workers taking part in the General Strike.

  • 1929

    The UK fall-out from a politically motivated trial in India (known as the Meerut Conspiracy Case) is taken up by Thompsons, which represents three English textile workers denied bail and refused a proper jury trial. The criminal case lasts for many years and leads to the conviction of all three, before going to appeal where their sentences are dramatically reduced.

  • 1934

    Thompsons secures damages for trespass on behalf of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement, after documents are seized illegally and used as the basis for a charge against the client. This case establishes the law that the seizure of documents without a warrant is illegal – which remains to this day.

  • 1934

    The National Council for Civil Liberties forms, with Harry Thompson as a founding member and member of the executive committee. The NCCL (now Liberty) starts its campaigns in the 1930s, particularly focussing on the activities of the Union of Fascists.

  • 1935

    A march in South Wales by thousands of unemployed people in response to cuts in the benefits system leads to arrests and becomes known as the Blaina Riots. Thompsons represents numerous men charged with assault and riot.

  • 1937

    Joan Beauchamp, who Harry Thompson married in August 1921, publishes Women Who Work following years of activism for women’s suffrage, alongside the likes of Charlotte Despard and Sylvia Pankhurst.

  • 1937

    Thompsons acts for trade unions to fight and win the momentous Wilsons and Clyde Coal Ltd v English case. This establishes, for the first time, that employers are liable for the safety of their workforce and becomes the cornerstone on which all workplace personal injury claims have since been based.

  • 1947

    Harry Thompson dies after complications following an operation, leaving behind his two sons, Brian and Robin, to lead what is by now Britain’s leading trade union law firm.

  • 1950

    Thompsons establishes the principle that an employer’s duty extends to the personal characteristics of the employee. The case finds that an employer has a higher duty of care towards a one-eyed WWII veteran, who loses the sight in his good eye, in an industrial accident.

  • 1956

    The UK’s first industrial disease case, involving exposure to Silica and the development of pneumoconiosis (a common miner’s disease), is won by Thompsons.

  • 1956

    Thompsons wins a ground-breaking case which establishes that employers are responsible for all of a worker’s ill-health if their negligence ‘materially contributes’ to that ill-health.

  • 1964

    Thompsons wins a leading case involving the intimidation of a trade unionist, in which the court upholds an award of punitive damages against an employer. This is a turning point in judicial activism in trade unions.

  • 1972

    Thompsons wins the first-ever successful asbestos-related disease case in the House of Lords.

  • 1974

    The Court of Appeal awards extra compensation to a client represented by Thompsons, after an injury at work leaves her permanently disabled, which could mean a loss of future earning capacity. The landmark case results in the potential for extra compensation for all injured workers.

  • 1974

    Brian Thompson works with the then Labour government to draft the Health and Safety at Work Act, which leads to approximately eight million employees being legally protected at work for the first time, and remains key legislation for the health and safety of workers today.

  • 1976

    Thompsons represents union members in the Grunwick Dispute, which is sparked by the film processing plant’s poor working conditions and refusal to recognise trade unions.

  • 1982

    Thompsons’ win in Williams v Compair Maxam Ltd defines standards of fairness for workers facing the threat of redundancy, which becomes a benchmark for all future cases.

  • 1983

    Thompsons pursues and wins a test case on industrial deafness and subsequently leads in negotiations that result in the ground-breaking National Deafness Scheme, resulting in compensation for hundreds of thousands of workers whose hearing has been impaired at work.

     

  • 1984

    Thompsons supports the National Union of Mineworkers during a national miners’ strike in sequestration proceedings against the union and criminal charges against hundreds of individuals. Thompsons’ employees stand with miners on the picket lines.

  • 1986

    Thompsons physically supports and legally represents thousands of trade unionists during the Wapping dispute. Thompsons’ lawyers attend the picket lines and accompany those arrested to defend them in court.

  • 1986

    The principle of latent damage is passed into law as a result of Thompsons’ work over the previous two decades, securing compensation for victims of industrial disease, whose claims would have previously been considered out of time.

  • 1987

    Firefighters attending fires started negligently are able to claim for damages as a result of Thompsons’ win in Ogwo v Taylor.

  • 1988

    Thompsons represents cook, Julie Hayward, in the UK’s first equal pay for equal value court judgment.

  • 1988

    Thompsons establishes that the losing party in a personal injury case can’t unreasonably delay paying costs from the date of judgment.

  • 1990

    Thompsons wins the first test cases for welders’ lung on behalf of former shipyard workers suffering a variety of respiratory injuries from exposure to welding fumes.

  • 1993

    Thompsons represents a number of speech therapists in a series of cases fighting for equal pay, which reaches the European Court of Justice. The Court finds that an employer cannot use a collective agreement to justify unequal pay, leading to the historic Agenda for Change – a national pay structure for the NHS.

  • 1994

    Thompsons wins the first successful case for a stress-induced illness caused as a result of work, leading to personnel departments all over the country having to consider emotional as well as physical well-being.

  • 1994

    Thompsons wins a landmark TUPE case on behalf of UNISON members at Orsett Hospital, meaning that if a new company takes over an existing employee’s contract the employee’s rights subsist.

  • 1997

    Thompsons brings, and wins, test cases for a group of Durham miners suffering from Vibration White Finger. This leads to the development of a national scheme compensating miners suffering from VWF.

  • 1998

    Thompsons supports a number of miners suffering from chronic bronchitis and emphysema in a series of successful test cases, which lead to the world’s largest national compensation scheme, known as the Respiratory Diseases Scheme.

  • 2002

    During a case heard in the House of Lords, Thompsons establishes that material contribution to asbestos exposure by one employer makes that employer liable for compensating the worker, regardless of any other exposure.

  • 2002

    The European Court of Justice rules in favour of a challenge brought by Thompsons on behalf of a UNISON member who had been excluded from pension benefits following a TUPE transfer.

  • 2002

    Thompsons represents a journalist in the first-ever successful case on behalf of a union or union member heard in the European Court of Human Rights. The Court rules in favour of Thompsons’ client, Mr Wilson, whose employers had sought to treat him less favourably because of his union membership.

  • 2002

    Thompsons represents a nurse in a successful claim following her developing a latex allergy from the repeated use of latex gloves. The case clarifies the extent of an employer’s duty to provide safe work equipment under the COSHH Regulations.

  • 2006

    Thompsons wins a finding in the House of Lords that FBU retained firefighters working part-time cannot be discriminated against over sickness benefits and pension rights.

  • 2007

    Thompsons wins back a UNISON member’s job in the UK’s first age discrimination case to go before an employment tribunal.

  • 2007

    The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act becomes law after 10 years of campaigning by victims’ families and trade unions, with Thompsons’ support.

  • 2008

    Thompsons wins a victory on behalf of a female train driver, who suffered tenosynovitis following inadequate training. The case helps define the modern principles of risk assessment.

  • 2009

    The European Court of Justice rules in Thompsons’ favour in Stringer v HMRC, leading to an amendment of the Working Time Regulations, which ensures entitlement to annual leave pay while absent from work for long periods of time.

  • 2011

    Thompsons wins a seminal judgment in the Court of Appeal, overturning the High Court’s decision to grant injunctions preventing strike action.

  • 2011

    Thompsons secures a landmark ruling on the false arrests of teachers, strengthening NASUWT’s calls for police guidance to be rewritten.

  • 2011

    The High Court rules employers should provide employees working in damp conditions with protective clothing in a major Unite the Union and Thompsons victory.

  • 2012

    In British Airways v Williams, Thompsons ensures the right to proper holiday pay for all money earned, including any supplemental pay.

  • 2015

    A challenge from Thompsons establishes that employers have a duty to make reasonable adjustments for disabled workers when applying sickness absence policies which place them at a disadvantage, changing the path down which case law was progressing.

  • 2016

    Thompsons successfully represents a POA member and catering manager at HMP Swansea, establishing that prisons are vicariously liable for prisoners negligently carrying out prison work, who injure staff as a result.

  • 2016

    Thompsons secures a victory against UK construction companies in a blacklisting case, recovering millions of pounds for hundreds of workers.

  • 2016

    In a landmark case for breastfeeding working women, Thompsons secures damages for two easyJet employees on the grounds of indirect sex discrimination.

  • 2017

    Thompsons wins an appeal in the Supreme Court on behalf of NASUWT members, minimising salary deductions for strike action.

  • 2017

    After breaking a national story regarding disgraced breast surgeon, Ian Paterson, Thompsons secures a multi-million-pound settlement for hundreds of women who received negligent treatment.

  • 2017

    After seven years of litigation challenging a promotion practice which indirectly discriminated on grounds of race and age, Thompsons’ win establishes that claimants are only required to show that a practice caused a disadvantage and not the reason why, as a group, they suffered that disadvantage.

  • 2018

    Thompsons wins a landmark case that protects those suffering from pre-cancer from being unfairly dismissed by their employer.

  • 2020

    Thompsons secures victory for BBC presenter, Samira Ahmed, in a breakthrough pay equity and transparency case.

  • 2020

    Thompsons safeguards wages for redundant Carluccio’s staff during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, providing a blueprint for how all employees of companies in administration during the pandemic should be treated.

  • 2020

    Thompsons ensures workers have a right to take lawful industrial action during the coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown.

  • 2021

    Thompsons successfully challenges the government’s introduction of a cap on public sector exit payments.

  • 2021

    A new fund is set up to compensate thousands of additional victims of jailed breast surgeon, Ian Paterson, and Thompsons is appointed to manage the claims.

  • 2021

    Thompsons wins the first case in the Supreme Court relating to trade union bargaining rights, establishing that employers cannot bypass or undermine union bargaining procedures.