General counsel will have to tool up if they are to get the insurance coverage they need in the UK and Europe. That was one of the key messages from US general counsel at the recent Legal Week roundtable on insurance litigation, held in association with Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Nicholson Graham (K&LNG).

Post-Spitzer and the AIG controversy earlier this year, there are several lessons to be learnt from across the Atlantic in "keeping brokers honest".

The current hot topic for US general counsel is directors and officers (D&O) insurance. According to Bill Trachsel, general counsel of United Technologies Corporation, in the days before the recent corporate catastrophes: "D&O was paying for nothing… Company indemnification was more important. Insurance was a pretty routine event. There was not much negotiating or much involvement from the general counsel." This is a view echoed by Tom Sager, assistant general counsel at DuPont. Company boards are now demanding "more accountability for insurance assets", he said, with the acquisition of insurance coverage becoming "increasingly complex and very adversarial".