This category can only be viewed by members.
Peter Kirby QC, a High Court costs assessor, provides guidance on how to ensure you recover your costs ‘The imperative is to try and get the budget right the first time and, if necessary, during the course of the litigation to have the same revised in the light of changing circumstances.’ Billy Joel once sang, …
Continue reading "Civil Procedure: Case Management Orders – when will a costs judge depart from them?"
This post is only available to members.
Bill Braithwaite QC discusses the difficult issues that arise ‘The basic principle is that professionals must respect the views and wishes of the family. The difficulty which pervades this aspect of a claim is that families only come to a considered position after much experience and, often, heart-searching.’Future care is almost always the most substantial …
Continue reading "Advocate’s Advice: Care in catastrophic claims"
This post is only available to members.
Justin Valentine argues that disclosure of all medical records in personal injury litigation is not necessary with modest claims ‘The pre-action protocols for low value personal injury claims provide that the medical expert should identify records relevant to the claim which should then be disclosed.’ It is not a precondition for bringing a modest claim …
Continue reading "Disclosure: Privacy v relevance"
This post is only available to members.
Paul Jones highlights a recent case concerning costs incurred during the transitional provisions ‘Even where the global costs have not been held to be disproportionate, it was still open to the judge to apply the test of necessity to individual costs which he considered to be disproportionate.’ The 1 April 2013 brought a new test …
Continue reading "Costs: Proportionality"
This post is only available to members.
Charles Bagot analyses the consequences of a recent decision ‘The observations of the senior judiciary that the Fatal Accidents Act is anomalous, while being plainly legal rather than political observations, may strike a chord with those in government and the civil service looking to reduce the level of compensation generally.’ This article considers a recent …
Continue reading "Reform: The ‘anomalous’ Fatal Accidents Act"
This post is only available to members.
Fatal Accidents Act; jurisdiction; assessment of damages ‘The Supreme Court upheld the decision that the damages rules of the Fatal Accidents Act could not be applied to Mrs Cox’s cause of action under the German Burgerliches Gezetzbuch (BGB).’In this case the Supreme Court considered whether provisions of the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 applied to the …
Continue reading "Case Report: Cox v Ergo Versicherung AG [2014] UKSC 22"
This post is only available to members.
Emma Sole reports on the effects of the judgment in Woodland v Essex County Council [2013] ‘The Supreme Court has not increased the scope of public authority liability, from a historical perspective, but rather preserved it at the level it had been before the advent of mass outsourcing.’In handing down its decision in Woodland v …
Continue reading "Non-Delegable Duties: A cause for concern?"
This post is only available to members.
Section 2 Mental Health Act 1983; duty of care; burden of proof ‘The case was determined based on the simple finding that the Trust, by its security personnel, failed to take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of the claimant; and that this failure caused him to suffer injury.’ The claimant sustained his head injuries …
Continue reading "Case Report: Webley v St George’s Hospital NHS Trust and anr [2014] EWHC 299"
This post is only available to members.
Jim Tindal summarises mental capacity, CPR 21 and Dunhill v Burgin [2014] ‘The issue at the heart of Dunhill was: what “claim” must the claimant have capacity to commence? The claim which it was wrongly believed at the time the claimant had, or the (much bigger) claim they in fact had unknown to anyone at …
Continue reading "Capacity: When does a settlement settle nothing?"
This post is only available to members.
Julian Matthews looks at the case law and some recent illustrations ‘The touchstone for liability in clinical negligence claims remains the Bolam test, and Chester and Birch do not warrant a wholly different approach in cases concerning advice.’ The standard of care the law requires of a doctor has become well established using the terms …
Continue reading "Clinical Negligence: What does a clinician have to tell the patient?"
This post is only available to members.
