The UK’s leading firm of independent costs lawyers

The Royal Courts of Justice

Judgment handed down in Brown v JMW Solicitors [2022] EWHC 2848 (SCCO).

Posted

Kain Knight deliver yet another blow to Checkmylegalfees in Brown v JMW Solicitors. In what is a sequel to Raubeheimer v Slater & Gordon heard earlier in the year, Costs Judge Rowley finds that a party asking questions concerning ATE premiums in Solicitors Act 1974 detailed assessment proceedings under CPR.r.18 is not entitled to answers where a party provides no factual or evidential basis in support of disputing a cash account containing an ATE premium. Judge Rowley said:

“In the absence of any stated suspicion, let alone any evidence to support it, the general questions posed are a paradigm example of a fishing expedition.”

Judge Rowley went on to find that, before an enquiry into an ATE premium in a solicitor/client detailed assessment can commence, a claimant must provide some evidence of an arguable case notwithstanding the practical difficulties a claimant may have in obtaining that evidence.

In a judgment that echoed the Master of the Rolls in Cam Legal Services Ltd v Belsner, handed down last month, Judge Rowley said:

“[The claimant] has not produced any evidence of an unsuccessful approach to bodies such as the Solicitors Regulation Authority or the Legal Ombudsman.  There is nothing to suggest that any such avenues of assistance have been explored.  As such, I do not accept the claimant’s argument that he had no option but to serve a Part 18 request to obtain information about the ATE policy.”

Arguably, these enquiries into ATE premiums were a line of business that survived Belsner. However, with Costs Judge Rowley’s findings in Brown v JMW Solicitors, it would seem that even that avenue is now closed.

Nick McDonnell

Judgment