Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2022 #188The case concerned various agreements (including a sale purchase agreement, a headstay agreement and an alleged oral agreement) transacted between the claimants and the defendant (among others) in connection with a business venture. It was alleged that the oral agreement obliged the defendant to redevelop, restructure, manage and/or dispose of assets within a hotel portfolio in order to maximise the financial benefit realised from such assets, and then to pay a share of the net financial benefit from such activity to the claimants. The true intention behind the oral agreement was a matte...
James Marwick and Marcus Coates-Walker provide an invaluable summary of the latest decisions in the ever-changing arena of Part 36 offers ‘Hislop, it is submitted, is yet another instance of the court having to construct a Part of the CPR which was simply not drafted with fixed costs in mind and where the poor drafting …
Continue reading "Part 36: An offer you can’t refuse"
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Oliver Middleton summarises a recent case of dishonesty and offers to settle ‘At first instance, the judge was asked to determine if the claimant’s alleged dishonest conduct rendered the usual cost consequences “unjust”, and should therefore be disapplied.’ In the recent case of Tuson v Murphy [2018], the Court of Appeal has overturned a decision …
Continue reading "Part 36: On the hoof"
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James Manning summarises the key findings in Tuson v Murphy and highlights the alternative tactics the defendant could have adopted in the case ‘At the time M made an unconditional Part 36 offer to T in settlement of the whole of her claim, M knew that T had concealed the fact that she had become …
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Johnathan Payne discusses how the way you pursue or defend a claim can impact on costs ‘This state of affairs has generated far more litigation in areas such as discontinuance, fundamental dishonesty and strike out.’ In 1931 Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World. The book was set in a futuristic world state of genetically-modified citizens …
Continue reading "Litigation tactics: Win, lose or pay either way"
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In the second of two articles, Suzanne Chalmers and Jack Macaulay report on dishonesty in the presentation of a claim ‘Claims that are entirely concocted are legally straightforward – if the truth is discovered, the claim will fail; if not, it will succeed. The law has had more difficulty in responding to claims where there …
Continue reading "Conduct: Lying to the court"
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Liam Ryan reviews the recent decision of Fletcher v Keatley and how a court should, and can, approach a claim for psychiatric injury where a claimant has been found to have purposefully exaggerated their symptoms ‘A judge doesn’t need to be bound unequivocally to one party’s expert evidence (although it will always be persuasive) and …
Continue reading "Dishonesty: Truth, lies, exaggeration and the judicial crucible"
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In part two of his article Steven Akerman continues his assessment of section 57’s incompatibility with human rights ‘It seems abundantly clear that the current state of the court’s opinion is that a claim will only be forfeited if the whole claim is tainted to the point that a finding at trial would be unsafe …
Continue reading "Human Rights: The limits of striking out powers"
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Steven Akerman examines the conflict between the new striking out powers and the Human Rights Act, in part one of this article he looks at the legislation ‘There is already authoritative UK case law that has determined that the legislation is not compatible with the said human rights provisions.’ The full effect of the Jackson …
Continue reading "Human Rights: Section 57? Incompatible… as decided by the Supreme Court"
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Gareth Price explores the situations in which QOCS protection might be forfeited ‘Where the “claim” is found, on the balance of probabilities, to be fundamentally dishonest, an order for costs may be enforced to the full extent with permission from the court.’ The effect of qualified one-way costs shifting (QOCS) is that any costs order …
Continue reading "QOCS: A costly situation"
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