Updates
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News
Extra funding in civil and family legal issues only scratches the surface
Funding provided to charities and legal advice centres in civil and family legal disputes is welcomed by the Law Society, who warned there must be proper investment in the whole legal aid system to provide effective access to justice.
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News
Ministry of Justice to extend fixed recoverable costs
Fixed recoverable costs will be extended, following a two-year pilot.
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News
Fixed recoverable costs pilot launches January 2019
A voluntary capped costs pilot runs from 14 January 2019 for two years in certain business and property courts for cases valued up to £250,000.
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Analysis
Switching from legal aid to a CFA
Can a claimant who has instructed solicitors on legal aid, switch to a CFA and recover the success fee and ATE premium? Imran Benson of Hailsham Chambers discusses the Court of Appeal (CA) judgment in Surrey v Barnet & Chase Farm Hospitals NHS Trust [2018] EWCA Civ 451.
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Analysis
Case commentary: Bailey v GlaxoSmithKline UK Ltd [2017] EWHC 3195 (QB)
Alison Kirby analyses this judgment in which the High Court has considered, for the first time, whether the Arkin cap - the principle that a funder’s potential liability for adverse costs will be limited to the amount of the funding provided - still fits.
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Analysis
What you really need to know about Merrix
Deborah Burke, chair of the Civil Litigation Section, offers her own take on this recent, headline-grabbing case on costs budgeting.
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News
Experience and innovation: dispute resolution funding in 2017
Rosie Ioannou explains why third party funding exploded in 2016, and what to expect of 2017.
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Analysis
Novus Aviation Ltd v Alubaf Arab International Bank BSC [2016] EWHC 1937 (Comm)
Commercial Court rules that the full effect of part 36 was unjust when sterling value had recently fallen against the dollar.
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News
HMCTS update: Help with Fees service
HMCTS has made some important changes to its Help with Fees process, the service that provides financial help for people on benefits or low income to pay for their court fees
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Analysis
Webb Resolutions Ltd v Countrywide Surveyors Ltd [2016] Ch Div (4 May 2016)
The court has held a claimant liable for a defendant’s costs of and incidental to an abandoned professional negligence claim, even though the claim form had not been served - good news for defendants aiming to recover costs incurred pre-action?
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Analysis
Bolt Burdon Solicitors v Tariq & Ors [2016] EWHC 811 (QB)
The court upholds a contingency fee agreement whereby the solicitors billed £498,083.52, whereas on a time basis the total would have been around £50,000.00 - an 800 per cent uplift
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Analysis
Great news for claimants? Fixed costs trumped by part 36 offer
Lord Dyson has ruled that assessed costs should trump fixed costs where claimants secure more than they had offered to settle for, and said that parliament had not intended to create a scheme to penalise claimants when it had established a fixed costs regime
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Analysis
Sugar Hut Group Ltd v AJ Insurance Service [2016] EWCA Civ 46
What are the costs consequences following the making of part 36 offers? The Court of Appeal overturns a decision on costs and confirms there is no ’near miss’ rule for part 36 offers
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Analysis
Supreme Court dismisses ParkingEye appeal: our analysis
In the first review of the law of penalties in a century, the Supreme Court has found in favour of ParkingEye 6-1. Cait Sweeney considers the implications of this hugely significant judgment
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Analysis
Kerins v Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust (unreported, 31 July 2015)
The court considered whether the conduct of the claimant’s solicitors had been unreasonable or improper within the meaning of CPR 44.11, conduct that included the intentional failure to disclose the existence of a CFA
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Analysis
Nokes v Heart of England Foundation NHS Trust [2015] EWHC B6 (Costs)
In one of the first judgments since the Jackson reforms, Master Leonard has given useful guidance on the extent of recoverability of post-LASPO ATE premiums in medical negligence claims
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Analysis
P v P [2015] EWCA Civ 447
Court of Appeal upholds Mr Justice Mostyn’s decision to vary a trust in a nuptial settlement, in order to meet the wife’s financial claim. In his judgment, Lord Justice Jackson gave guidance about the procedure to appeal a High Court decision
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Analysis
Cashman v Mid Essex Hospital Services NHS Trust [2015] EWHC 1312 (QB)
The High Court overrules a senior costs judge, after he denied a claimant who made a successful part 36 offer in detailed assessment proceedings the additional 10% uplift
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Analysis
CIP Properties Ltd (AIPT) v Galliford Try Infrastructure Ltd [2015] EWHC 481 (TCC)
How to deal with costs management in circumstances where the claimant’s budget was “entirely unreliable” and where the costs were “wholly disproportionate”
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Analysis
Hamed v Mills & Tottenham Hotspur Football Club [2015] EWHC 298 (QB)
In this case, which provides a useful example of cost assessment in cases where there are two parties and part 36 offers, the court found negligence on the part of a doctor and football club in a claim brought by a professional football player