Personal Injury Blogs Archive

Ropewalk Chambers is ranked as a top tier set in the field of personal injury in the latest edition of the Legal 500. This is an outstanding achievement for our personal injury barristers. We have been described as offering “an excellent service together with outstanding barristers” with “a team able to advise and represent individuals…

“…it will be rare for a claim to be fundamentally dishonest without the Claimant also being fundamentally dishonest, although that might be a theoretical possibility, at least“ When Julian Knowles J made the above observation in London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (in liquidation) v Sinfield [2018] EWHC 501 (QB) it was…

The court in Covey v Harris [2021] EWHC 2211 (QB) acceded to the Defendant’s application to amend its defence to plead fundamental dishonesty made less than a month before trial. Given the court’s refusal of a similar application made by the Defendant in Mustard v Flower [2021] EWHC 846 (QB) (see Philip Davy’s blog here), one questions how…

In the context of a potentially high value claim following a road traffic accident involving a young Claimant, HHJ Walden-Smith recently refused the Claimant’s application to vacate a trial to be listed in a trial window commencing November 2021 and to stay proceedings. The case was that of Lavender v Liverpool Victoria Insurance Co Ltd [2021]…

In the High Court case of Chan v (1) Peters (2) Advantage Insurance Company Ltd [2021] EWHC 2004 (QB), Cavanagh J took the opportunity to carefully distil the main principles at play when considering liability and contributory negligence in a road traffic accident case. The case concerned a 17-year-old Claimant who was struck by a car…

In an attempt to modernise an oft-labelled ‘antiquated’ justice sytem, a view more compelling in light of the difficulties faced during the recent COVID-19 pandemic, Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) has developed a programme of reform, which has been underway since 2016. The most recent measure to be introduced is the Damages Claims…

In an appeal which raises questions of a trial judge’s evidential analysis, you could be forgiven for assuming that obtaining a transcript of the evidence should be the first job on any appellant file handler’s ‘to do’ list. However, the High Court has confirmed that, in some instances, obtaining a transcript may be unnecessary for…

In AL (by her Mother and Litigation Friend, S) v Collingwood Insurance Company Ltd [2021] EWHC 1761 (QB), a catastrophic brain injury case, Robin Knowles J provided further guidance to practitioners as to the application of the established principles previously laid down in Eeles v Cobham Hire Services Ltd [2010] 1 WLR 409. In a…

“That the tort of negligence is a mess goes almost without saying.” So said David Ibbetson in How the Romans Did for Us: Ancient Roots of the Tort of Negligence (2003) 26 UNSWLJ 475. As James Plunkett put it in The Duty of Care in Negligence (Hart Publishing, 2018), p. 76:  Since Donoghue v Stevenson…

In TUI v Morgan [2021] PIQR P12, the Respondent, Mrs Morgan, sustained injury whilst on a package holiday to Mauritius, which she purchased from the Appellant, TUI. She was walking along an outdoor, unlit sun terrace at the hotel where she was staying when she collided with a heavy wooden sunbed, fell and sustained injuries…

On 27 November 2020, the High Court handed down judgment in James West v Joseph Olakanpo [2020] EWHC 3830 (QB) which concerns both dishonesty and the ‘exceptional circumstances’ test for costs exceeding fixed costs in low value personal injury claims under rule 45.29J of the Civil Procedure Rules. Rule 45.29J Section IIIA of Part 45 applies…

In May 2021, following preparation by an advisory working group of its Professional Standards Unit, the British Psychological Society, Division of Neuropsychology, published Good Practice Guidelines on the recording of neuropsychological examinations and testing under the title “Guidance on the Recording of Neuropsychological Testing in Medicolegal Settings”. The Guidance is aimed at Clinical Neuropsychologists undertaking…