Catherine Wolfenden

Catherine is a dynamic market leading regulated public procurement lawyer, ranked Band One in Chambers & Partners.  She has focussed on delivering practical and commercial solutions to clients' regulatory issues for over 20 years.

Catherine leads a specialist team of Regulatory Disputes lawyers, focussed on delivering commercial solutions to businesses compliance and regulatory conundrums.

As a specialist regulated procurement lawyer, she draws on vast experience acting both for and against central government and wider public sector bodies. Catherine's priority is always to ensure that the procurement rules are a facilitator, not an impediment: a means to achieving the client's strategic goals, not an end in themselves. Catherine is recognised as one of the leading public procurement litigators and is ranked as a Band 1 lawyer in Chambers UK 2023.

Acting for clients in all sectors where there is a public / private interface, she is particularly well known for her extensive experience in Healthcare, Technology and Infrastructure procurement projects.

Catherine has been a Partner at Osborne Clarke since 2011.

Helping you succeed in tomorrow's world

I am so proud to lead an amazing diverse, dedicated team of regulatory lawyers who are respected by all the clients they work with.  We help clients shape and respond to regulatory changes being driven by the transformational changes of digitalisation, decarbonisation and urban dynamics.

The regulated procurement lawyers I work with are particularly recognised for their ability to use their advisory experience to deliver the best outcomes in litigation. Our forensic approach to dissecting tender documents and procurement processes is required in order to advise on the merits of a procurement challenges. We use this knowledge to approach major procurements for our clients (whether contracting authorities or suppliers) to challenge and test evaluation criteria and methodologies.  This broad contentious experience means we advise with a depth of knowledge on risk of challenge to a procurement process, so clients know where to focus their time and resources appropriately.  We also represent clients in repelling initial challenges to a procurement process and defending challenges which proceed to litigation.
 

Catherine Wolfenden is a go-to lawyer for procurement law advice. She is always amazingly responsive, a pleasure to deal with and has a wealth of expertise - this combined with her pragmatic advice is a winning combination."

An excellent procurement lawyer - very easy to work with."