Costs orders following budgeting – two recent cases

Costs orders following budgeting – two recent cases Worcester v Hopley [2024] EWHC 2181 (KB) (21 Aug 2024) Jenkins v Thurrock Council [2024] EWHC 2248 (KB) (9 Sept 2024) Two judgments recently handed down by Master Thornett illustrate the risk of adverse costs orders being made at Costs Management Conferences…

Third Party Costs Orders and Experts: Order Restored

Miss Martine Robinson v Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Trust v Mr Christopher Mercier [2023] EWHC 21 (KB) Sweeting J in the High Court allowed a medico-legal expert’s appeal against a Third Party Costs Order (“TPCO”) made against him. The TPCO had awarded the Defendant NHS Trust the full sum of…

Variable PPOs and No Award of Costs of a PI Trust for a Claimant with Capacity

Celine Martin (formerly known as Vicky Kathleen Higgins) v Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust [2022] EWHC 532 This is a clinical negligence case arising out of the treatment of the Claimant at Salford Royal Hospital (known as Hope Hospital) in the summer of 2010. The litigation has resulted in three…

Liability Determination Does Not Automatically Lead to Entitlement to Detailed Assessment

ABA v University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust [2022] EWHC B4 This case confirms a point of some significance for Claimant lawyers which must be borne in mind when liability issues are resolved either by judgment or settlement, leaving the quantum of damages to be assessed. The short point…

Third Party Costs Orders and Experts

Robinson v Mercier, Liverpool County Court [2021] 9 WLUK 400 The Court made a Third Party Costs Order (“TCPO”), in the sum of £50,543.85, pursuant to Part 46.2 and Part 46.8 CPR 1998 and Section 51 of the Senior Courts Act 1981, against Dr Mercier, General Dental Practitioner.  Dr Mercier…

QOCS and Set-Off

Ho v Adelekun [2021] UKSC 43 In a case to which qualified one-way costs shifting (‘QOCS’) applies, can a defendant set-off a costs order in its favour against the claimant’s costs where there is no damages award that the defendant can set-off its costs against? That was the issue which…

Equivocal Admissions and Inquest Costs

Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service v Veevers [2020] EWHC 2550 (Comm) An admission of liability before an inquest can have a substantial effect on the recoverability of the family’s inquest costs. An early and full admission may extinguish them entirely. But in the cautionary case of Veevers, the High…

Costs Update

Re PLK [2020] 9 WLUK 364 An end to the 2010 level of costs recovery set by the Guideline Hourly Rates for Costs Review is under way, some comfort in the meantime comes from Master Whalan in the SCCO in Re PLK [2020] 9 WLUK 364. For the past decade…

Fundamental Dishonesty Removes Costs Protection

David Pegg v (1) David Webb (2) Allianz Insurance PLC [2020] EWHC 2095 (QB) Introduction Martin Spencer J held that a judge had erred in dismissing a personal injury claim but not finding that the Claimant had been fundamentally dishonest and, given the finding of fundamental dishonesty, CPR Rule 44.16…

Costs Update

Costs is not always the first thought on a clinical negligence practitioner’s mind, but the first 6 months of this year have been busy with relevant costs decisions. Here are the author’s top 10 useful costs decisions to keep in mind as you plan, practice, and seek to recover /…