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Civil Way: 16 October 2020

15 October 2020 / Stephen Gold
Issue: 7906 / Categories: Features , Procedure & practice , Civil way
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Ditching SJE principles; Fast tribunal listing in employment; Oral exam docs not for show; What the Judge ordered

EXPERT ABANDONMENT

Having given permission to appeal in the noise induced hearing loss claim of Hinson v Hare Realizations Ltd [2020] EWHC 2386 (QB), Martin Spencer J disappointed the claimant by throwing the appeal out. The single joint engineering expert had been against the claimant. Three days before the fast track trial which had been twice adjourned, the claimant applied for a further adjournment and permission to rely on his unilaterally instructed expert who would have been for him and for consequential case management directions including a retracking. There was good reason for the lateness but the application was dismissed, as then was the claim on its merits.

What should be the approach to an application to abandon a single joint expert and adduce unilaterally instructed expert evidence? The correct approach, decided the appeal judge, was that set out by Eady J in Bulic v Harwoods [2012] EWHC 3657 who had referred

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Druces LLP—Afsor Ullah

Druces LLP—Afsor Ullah

Partner appointed head of Islamic finance

Birketts—Rachel Frost-Smith

Birketts—Rachel Frost-Smith

Legal director named as new head of children

Kingsley Napley—Tristan Cox-Chung

Kingsley Napley—Tristan Cox-Chung

Firm bolsters restructuring and insolvency team with partner hire

NEWS
Criminal defence lawyers have expressed dismay at the Lord Chancellor David Lammy’s plans to reduce the backlog by scaling back jury trials to murder, rape, homicide and other indictable crimes where the sentence is three years or more
MPs will vote next week on an amendment to fast-track the change to the unfair dismissal qualifying period, as the government’s flagship Employment Rights Bill returns to the Commons
Barristers have been warned to be on guard against anthropomorphism, hallucinations, information disorder, bias in data training, mistakes, data protection blunders and confidential data leaks when using generative artificial intelligence (AI)
Legal aid lawyers have welcomed increased fees for criminal, housing and immigration work
Public willingness to take part in class actions is rising, according to annual research by communications consultancy Portland
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