Jackson to pilot capped costs scheme
There is to be a voluntary pilot to test capping costs for claims up to £250,000, in the first concrete outcome of Lord Justice Jackson’s (pictured) review of fixed recoverable costs. The maximum a party will be able to recover will be £80,000.
It will run for two years in the London Mercantile Court or the Mercantile, Chancery or Technology and Construction courts in Manchester and Leeds (excluding personal injury cases).
There will be a streamlined procedural code providing for a list of issues reviewed at the case management conference (CMC), streamlined disclosure, limits on fact and expert evidence, and a trial no more than two days in length (excluding reading). The trial will be fixed within eight months of the CMC.
The cap for each stage will be: pre-action (£10,000), particulars of claim (£7,000), defence and counterclaim (£7,000), reply and defence to counterclaim (£6,000), CMC (£6,000), disclosure (£6,000), witness statements (£8,000), experts’ reports (£10,000), trial and judgment (£20,000), settlement/negotiations/mediation (£10,000), making or responding to an application (£3,000), work done post-issue which is not otherwise covered by any of the stages (£5,000).
To deal with claimant part 36 offers, the scheme will provide that costs will be assessed in the same way (i.e. indemnity basis) but subject to a higher cap – provisionally put at 25% – of what the cap(s) would have been, meaning that the absolute maximum a party could recover is £100,000.
Master Simons retires
Master Simons retired last Friday. Now 70, Master Simons was admitted as a solicitor in 1971. He was appointed as a deputy taxing master of the Supreme Court Taxing Office in 1996 and a taxing master of the Senior Courts Costs Office in 2001.
QM Costs merges with Legal Costs Negotiators
Defendant costs firms QM Costs and Legal Costs Negotiators have merged to create a 32-person strong business (including four Costs Lawyers). They have taken new office space in Liverpool and will be known as QM Costs.
Managing director John Webb said: “In a climate where many similar providers are finding themselves leaving the market, we have strengthened our position as a key player in the increasingly complex legal costs market.
“We will continue to focus on profitable growth, benefiting from the obvious synergies, shared resources and process efficiencies allowing greater flexibility and economies of scale. This in turn will be invested in our people, technology and service to ensure an enhanced proposition to clients.”
Latest costs encyclopaedia published
Class Legal has published the 2017-18 version of its Costs & Fees Encyclopaedia. Its consultant editors are former costs judge Colin Campbell and Costs Lawyer Teresa Aitken. It costs £70.