Post-traumatic stress disorder: Diagnostic and liability issues

Rushmi Sethi analyses military personal injury claims concerning post-traumatic stress disorder ‘Deployed reservists still have a higher prevalence of probable PTSD than non-deployed reservists despite several initiatives by the MoD. There was a significant association between deployment and probable PTSD in regular personnel who had a combat role during deployment.’ Traumatic events such as combat, …
This post is only available to members.

Part 36 offers: All-inclusive

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 …
This post is only available to members.

Case report: Duce v Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust [2018] EWCA Civ 1307

Limits of the duty of informed consent; breach of duty; causation ‘The confirmation of the need to satisfy the but for test is consistent with a long line of recent authority.’ In Montgomery v Lanarkshire Health Board [2015] it was held that the doctor must take reasonable care to ensure that a patient is aware …
This post is only available to members.

Indemnity costs: Presume nothing

Andrew Post QC and Imran Benson look at how there is no presumption in favour of indemnity costs on late acceptance of a Part 36 offer ‘The only way out of the fixed-costs regime in such a case is to argue under Part 45.29J that there are exceptional circumstances making it appropriate for the claimant …
This post is only available to members.

RTA claims: The government’s proposed personal injury reforms

Donna Scully considers the possible consequences of the Ministry of Justice’s fundamental change to how low-value road traffic accident claims are handled ‘The government’s latest round of reforms are a very blunt instrument to supposedly tackle the costs of legal services and fraud.’ After approaching three years of argument and dispute, the debate on the …
This post is only available to members.

Litigation tactics: Win, lose or pay either way

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 …
This post is only available to members.

Costs: Mixing it up with QOCS

Paul Jones explains the costs consequences when claims involve both personal injury and non-personal-injury elements ‘The defendant’s case was that the inclusion of a personal injury claim within a much wider claim involving non-personal-injury claims did not entitle the claimant to QOCS protection as the matter fell within the ambit of the CPR 44.16(2)(b) exception.’ …
This post is only available to members.