Costs

It was settled law that the task of the court under s 71 of the Solicitors Act 1971 was to assess the costs as between the solicitor and client and only upon completion of that task, should the court determine to what extent those costs could be legitimately passed on to the third party; the latter exercise would be carried out either under CPR 48.3 which could be simultaneous with the assessment under s 71, or by an action for an account by the third party. On an assessment under s 71 of the Act the court was entitled to interfere with the hourly rate agreed between the solicitor and the client; but only to the extent that it could have interfered with it at the behest of the client.