Fraudulent conduct is no bar to a genuine claim, say David Hadfield & Sara Partington
The Court of Appeal has recently revisited the law and given valuable clarification relating to the impact of fraudulent claims by third parties on any genuine underlying claim which they may themselves have (see Anita Shah v Wasim Ul-Haq & Others ([2009] EWCA Civ 542, [2009] All ER (D) 71 (Jun)). Insurers in particular are all too familiar with fraudulent claims arising out road traffic accidents or to an extent in other personal injury claims.
It has become so common that one county court judge was moved to observe: “Unhappily such fraudulent claims are now legion. They occupy the court time of District Judges and Circuit Judges…literally week in and week out. My own judicial experience reflects, I have no doubt, that of many of my brethren throughout the country.
Just about every variant of a fraudulent claim comes before the court, including deliberately staged collisions, damage caused to vehicles which have never been in collision at all,
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