While the Department of Health consults on fixed recoverable costs in clinical negligence, senior lawyers have issued warnings over Lord Justice Jackson’s proposed extension of fixed recoverable costs for claims of up to £250,000 in other areas of law.
Jackson LJ, an enthusiastic exponent of fixed costs, is conducting a review of whether they can be expanded, and recently issued a call for evidence on the subject. Currently, fixed costs apply to personal injury claims for up to £25,000.
However, lawyers have identified several concerns.
The Association of Costs Lawyers (ACL) warned Jackson LJ that it is “too soon” for a radical extension of fixed recoverable costs.
Other reforms must be introduced first, and recent reforms assessed for their impact, before fixed costs can be introduced, the ACL said. Moreover, it said many of the civil justice reforms introduced on the back of Jackson LJ’s review of civil justice costs, such as active case and costs management, were already “proving successful” in restricting many of the excesses of litigation.
The ACL highlighted defamation, actions against the police and judicial review, as well as clinical negligence, as areas where fixed costs would be unfair and unworkable.
In its response to Jackson LJ, Hodge, Jones & Allen said that expanding fixed legal costs was “perverse and unfair”, and would only benefit deep-pocket defendants.
The firm said the playing field is made reasonably level by conditional fee agreements, and that “fixed costs in our view would upset the balance significantly in favour of the defendants”.
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