Courting change

Hard on the heels of the Jackson and Young reviews and proposed cuts to the ambit of legal aid, comes another consultation from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ): Solving Disputes in the County Courts: Creating a simpler, quicker and more proportionate system, the responses to which are due in by the end of the month. In addition, the white paper dealing with the implementation of the Jackson reforms was published this week and it is unclear how the changes proposed in the consultation will tie in with this, or how all these ambitious changes will be funded.

If implemented, the proposals outlined in the consultation are likely to be a “double-whammy” for litigators already dealing with the changes to litigation funding being pushed through, including irrecoverability of the conditional fees arrangements uplift, and after-the-event insurance premiums. It is very difficult at this stage to predict exactly what the litigation landscape will look like in five years time.

It is clear from the consultation that