The Guideline Hourly Rates changed on 1st January 2026. These are set out below. The 2025 and 2024 rates can be found underneath. Guideline hourly rates 2026 (with previous year’s rates in brackets) Grade Fee Earner London 1 London 2…
This section looks at decisions in relation to relief from sanctions and the general principles of CPR 3.9. Often there are links to the decisions themselves, together with links to posts on this blog. CASES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER May 2026…
The Civil Justice Council is carrying out a Consultation on the Use of AI for the preparation of court documents. It published an update on its consultation findings yesterday. The preliminary view appears to be that the use of AI…
The previous post contained a review of the judge’s comments in the Farepak case. The judicial observations that witness statements are often misused and misunderstood is one of an extremely large number of such observations. (The “Related Posts” section below…
Recent posts have revisited the age-old problem of witness statements being misused. They often contain argument and comment. For that reason we are revisiting the observations of Mr Justice Smith in the Farepak case farepak-judges-statement. It presents an object lesson…
We are again looking at the lessons that practitioners can learn from a Legal Ombudsman decision. This time it relates to the need to explain the consequences of taking a procedural step. The point here is that many matters that…
This post arises out of the previous post in the series. However here I want to concentrate on one issue arising out of this. The claimant’s solicitors appear to have advised the claimant that they would not be liable to…
Not all fatal claims fall neatly under the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 framework or the general rules of personal injury damages. This is an area where practitioners have to act with great sensitivity but also where a detailed knowledge of…
This series is about examining cases where things went wrong for litigators and what readers can do to avoid this happening to them. The aim is not to criticise those who make mistakes but to use their experience to prevent…
The Online Procedure Rules have been published and come into force on the 7th September 2026. Initially these apply just to possession proceedings. However they are a sign of things to come. ” The Overriding Objective of these Rules is to…
Here we have an example of a judge clearly rejecting the expert evidence adduced on behalf of a defendant and giving clear grounds for the criticism of them. This was in the context of a case where the defendant had…
This is an interesting case on clinical negligence where judgment was given today. It warrants (and will receive) several posts. Here we look at the trial judge’s rejection of the argument that adverse inferences should be drawn when the claimant…
The renewal process has being going through smoothly for most people. There are a few issues. Her we look at renewal notices, some issues with renewal and card payments, upgrading accounts and a reminder that a Corporate Account always…
Here we look at the judge’s comments on expert evidence arising from a complex case in the Commercial Court. The judgment provides a reminder that experts should not be instructed to comment on matters of fact which are the sole…
This is a case where the judge had no hesitation in striking out both a defence and counterclaim. The counterclaim had no prospect of success, the defence breached every rule and principle relating to statements of case. The judge, helpfully,…
Here we are, with no apology, looking at the same case in the earlier post again. The earlier post dealt with the issue of relief from sanction. Here I want to concentrate on the litigant’s deliberate decision to breach the…
Here we look at a strongly worded judgment where relief from sanctions was refused. A party had exceeded the page limit set by court directions and also served the statement late. The judge dismissed the arguments that the other side…
Fatal accident claims involving children present unique and sensitive legal challenges for practitioners. This webinar examines claims brought on behalf of children as well as claims arising from the death of a child, highlighting the procedural, evidential, and dependency issues…
This is a judgment that considers the difficult issue of whether a claimant, who has been put to unnecessary costs of pursuing to separate actions because of the defendant’s conduct, can claim the unnecessary elements of costs back as damages. …
For those who could not make the live broadcast yesterday the webinar is available “on demand”. Viewers also receive copies of a series of checklists and guides to compliance. Including A general Supervision Checklist The Litigation Supervisor Checklist The Supervised…
This is a case where the judge had to consider whether a successful claimants costs should be reduced because of conduct. The judge found that there were grounds to criticise the claimant’s conduct of the action. However this could not…
CPR 39.6 permits a company to be represented by an employee where the employee is authorised by the company and the court gives permission. We have here a case where the proposed representative only became an employee part-way through the…
Today we look at the posts from June 2013, that is the month that Civil Litigation Brief first started as a blog (24th June 2013). Prior to that it had been a monthly (and when the Civil Procedure Rules were…
As you can see from the “Related Posts” section below this is not the first time we have considered the position where a losing litigant has written to the judge seeking “clarification” and where the judge has felt that this…
We look at a case that relates to a solicitor’s lien and alleged breach of duty by those solicitors. It also deals with the basis upon which a judge should determine an application to strike out/summary judgment – making it…
We are returning to the SRA Guidance on Effective Supervision, this time looking at the importance that is given to recording the supervision arrangements. It is clear that the SRA expects these to be written down. I have provided a…
An application to set aside a properly obtained default judgment requires the court to consider a number of factors. Having considered whether there are “real prospects” of successfully defending the claim and the issue of promptness the court then goes…
We are continuing our examination of the High Court judgment yesterday about setting aside a default judgment. Here the judge considered the question of “promptness” in circumstances where the default judgment had been entered for a year before the application…
Knowing what the “conduct of litigation” means is an essential piece of knowledge for all litigators. If you allow “unauthorised” persons to conduct litigation then you (and they) are committing a criminal offence (and you are also in contempt of…
A defendant applying to set aside a properly obtained default judgment has a number of hurdles to clear. The court will consider the “merits” of the proposed defence, the reason for the delay, “promptness” and then go on to consider…
There are several cases where the courts have observed that attempts to allow a witness to give evidence from abroad are not, in fact, legal. This was highlighted in a judgment yesterday. Some countries have particular rules governing the taking…
In this case the judge expressly sets out a method of instructing the experts which would have been of more assistance to the court. In essence that the valuation experts should have been instructed, initially, without any knowledge of the…
In a judgment today the Court of Appeal have overturned a High Court decision that was (partially) in favour of a solicitor who had sought judicial review of a decision of the Legal Ombudsman. The Court has restored the Ombudsman’s…
The previous post dealt with a case where a participant in a relatively small dispute about shared childcare was found guilty of putting “deepfake” evidence before the courts. This provides a wake up call to us all that our clients,…
We have looked at the problems caused by Artificial Intelligence many times on this blog. Practitioners also have to be aware of the possibility that the evidence they are given by their own clients, or used by the other side,…
Here we look at a case where a defendant local authority had to apply for relief from sanctions in relation to breaches of court orders and directions. The judge was critical of the defendant’s conduct, pointing out that there was…
Here we have an unusual example of the Court of Appeal overturning a decision granting permission to amend a statement of case (in this case a counterclaim). The Court of Appeal held that the pleading did not give the information…
We are continuing with our examination of the updated SRA Guidance on Effective Supervision. This is a relatively short section but of considerable importance. There is a series of checklists on this topic (these are produced for this blog and…
Regular readers will know that a recurring theme of this blog is the number of ways in which a case can go wrong, and how often the damage is done by something that should have been straightforward. A multiplier, an…
Here we look at a case where the court made an order for indemnity costs. The defendant had failed to engage fully in the litigation process and, importantly, failed to respond to the claimant’s offer to mediate. The Master was…
The SRA’s new Guidance on Effective Supervision represents one of the most significant developments in the regulation of litigation practice in recent years.The guidance introduces enhanced expectations around supervision, delegation, escalation, professional judgment, accountability and quality assurance. It also carries…
This blog has been looking at cases relating to civil procedure for 13 years this month. We have seen many hundreds (possibly thousands) of cases where things have gone badly wrong, particularly in relation to procedure and limitation. Most of…
Some significant changes are taking place in court fees on the 13th July 2026. Some 170 fees will increase in line with inflation. Four sets of fees will be reduced to reflect reductions in their underlying costs. In addition there…
There are hundreds of applications made each date to courts up and down the land. Pausing for a second, how many of those applications are made without the solicitor looking at the rules and Practice Direction relating to making applications….
Here we are looking at another case where the court considered the burden of proof in an application for security for costs. In this case the claimant was ordered to provide security. An interesting feature is the identified failure of…
You could study the Fatal Accidents Act for a long time, decades even, and have no clue at all as to how damages are assessed. This is because the relevant principles are in set out in case law. A detailed…
The earlier post on time estimates has prompted me to revisit the issue with some practical suggestions for practitioners. Here we have a review of the cases, the key points that emerge and a series of checklists of the issues…
Here we look at a judgment given today which highlights the importance of considering the existence of pre-existing insurance policies when solicitors are acting for a claimant. The judge held that the solicitors had made inadequate enquiries in relation to…
We have looked at the issue of accurate time estimates many times. Here we have a case where the parties agreed to a time estimate for a hearing that, the judge found, was clearly inaccurate. The judge observed that this…
Yesterday I wrote about the SRA Guidance in relation to choosing supervisors. Despite supervision being central to a well run, and profitable, legal practice there is little guidance given to lawyers on how to go about being a good supervisor. …
Here we look back to a post from June 2016. It is a summary of guidance given by a Canadian Judge. The link to the original post on the matter is now defunct. However the summary given here gives the…
Here we look at some comments made yesterday by the Court of Appeal. The court allowed an appeal by a defendant in a personal injury case. The case was heard by a Deputy District Judge. The court was clear that…
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