‘The Legal Aid Agency—formally known as the Legal Service Commission (LSC) —was wrong to refuse to pay the full cost of an expert witness report ordered for a child by the family court.’
New Law Journal, 28th May 2014
Source: www.newlawjournal.co.uk
Secretary of State for the Home Department (Appellant) v MN and KY (Respondent) [2014] UKSC 30 (YouTube)
Supreme Court, 21st May 2014
‘There has been a large increase in unrepresented claimants, outbreaks of courtroom violence, extra litigation and increased costs, according to senior judges who have criticised the impact of legal aid cuts in the family courts.’
The Guardian, 14th May 2014
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
‘New combined Family Courts have come into being in England and Wales as part of family justice system reforms.’
BBC News, 22nd April 2014
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
‘Expert determination is a process in which parties to a contract jointly instruct a third party to decide an issue between them. Its advantages are self-evident: quick, cheap, informal and contract-based, it has obvious attractions and can be found in many commercial contracts.’
Hardwicke Chambers, 3rd April 2014
Source: www.hardwicke.co.uk
‘Judges have dismissed an appeal bid by a woman who beat her son to death for failing to memorise the Koran.’
BBC News, 28th March 2014
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
‘Britain’s compensation culture is a “national phenomenon,” a High Court judge said as he refused to grant damages to two women to “stem the tide” of fake insurance claims.’
Daily Telegraph, 26th March 2014
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
‘On 13 March 2014 the Court of Appeal handed down judgment in the case of Rogers & Rogers v Hoyle. The appeal deals with two significant issues that can arise in any area of civil practice: the status and admissibility of opinion evidence outside of CPR Part 35 and the extent of the long-standing rule in Hollington v Hewthorn.’
Henderson Chambers, 13th March 2014
Source: www.hendersonchambers.co.uk
‘In his monthly column, James Bickford Smith discusses the Court of Appeal’s recent guidance on communications with judges after draft judgments are circulated, some interesting judicial
observations on defective witness statements, and the Commercial Court’s important relief from
sanctions decision in Re C (A Child) [2014] EWCA Civ 70.’
Littleton Chambers, 7th March 2014
Source: www.littletonchambers.com
‘Martin Burns provides five important factors to consider when instructing an expert witness (or acting as one).’
New Law Journal, 28th February 2014
Source: www.newlawjournal.co.uk
‘This is the sad tale of a young woman aged 31 dying in mysterious circumstances where the inquest went off entirely on the wrong footing. Joanne Foreman was not a diabetic but lived with a young boy who was. It was suspected that on the night before she died she had drunk heavily and then injected herself with insulin. The inquest proceeded on this basis. Nobody told the expert that the paramedics had taken a blood glucose from Joanne, which was entirely normal. Once this was known, it was obvious that the court would quash the findings at inquest and order a new inquest.’
UK Human Rights Blog, 25th February 2014
Source: www.ukhumanrightsblog.com
Wall v Mutuelle de Poitiers Assurances [2014] EWCA 12; [2014] WLR (D) 86
‘Where a cyclist had been run down in France and brought proceedings in the English courts seeking damages for personal injury, the question whether there should be one single joint expert, or more than one expert pursuant to CPR Pt 35, was a matter of “evidence and procedure” within the meaning of article 1(3) of Parliament and Council Regulation (EC) No 864/2007. Therefore the question of which expert evidence the court should order fell to be determined in accordance with English and not French law.’
WLR Daily, 20th February 2014
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
‘It can be difficult at the best of times to establish liability in claims involving pedestrians. Expert evidence should, hopefully, make the task easier, but this case is a useful reminder that even seemingly robust expert evidence may not be enough for a party to succeed.’
Zenith Chambers, 5th February 2014
Source: www.zenithchambers.co.uk
‘We are all sadly familiar with the last-minute application for an adjournment backed
by a doctor’s note, on the grounds that the defendant, claimant or important witness
is unfit to attend Court. Almost inevitably, the note in question is unsatisfactory or
insufficient. It frequently takes the jejune form of “Mrs X is suffering from an anxiety
state and is unfit to attend Court”, and that is all.’
Zenith Chambers, 5th February 2014
Source: www.zenithchambers.co.uk
‘Cuts to legal aid have thrown family proceedings into chaos, say Kim Beatson, Caroline Bowden & Ellen Lucas.’
New Law Journal, 10th February 2014
Source: www.newlawjournal.co.uk
‘The new independent medical panels to assess whiplash injuries are on course for implementation this year after the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) began putting together a working group to take them forward.’
Litigation Futures, 16th January 2014
Source: www.litigationfutures.com
‘John Sweeney investigates the secretive world of the family courts and asks whether some parents may have unfairly lost their children forever. BBC One 13th January 2014’
BBC One, 13th January 2014
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
Resolution Chemicals Ltd v H Lundbec A/S: [2013] EWCA Civ 1515; [2013] WLR (D) 453
‘The fair-minded and informed observer, having considered the facts, would not conclude that there was a real possibility that the judge would be subconsciously biased in his assessment of the evidence of an expert witness in a patent action where the witness had been the judge’s research supervisor at university.’
WLR Daily, 25th November 2013
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
“The government’s response to the consultation paper on whiplash claims has recently been published. Within it, the government scraps the idea of raising the small claims limit for personal injury claims to £5,000; a measure which would capture most road traffic claims in the UK. It was seen by many as a pivotal brick in the Jackson campaign for proportionate costs, as it would fix the costs entitlement for most whiplash claims at fixed commencement costs for small claims. This would net a significant saving in adverse costs payments at a national level. So, why was a measure of seemingly vital importance discarded so summarily by the government?”
Halsbury’s Law Exchange, 15th November 2013
Source: www.halsburyslawexchange.co.uk
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