A litigation nightmare

Anyone with an interest in settlement processes as a means of avoiding wasteful litigation will have read the two judgments in Newman v Framewood Manor Management Co Ltd [2012] EWCA Civ 159 and [2012] EWCA Civ 1727 with despair and frustration. If ever there was a set of circumstances that cried out for mediation it was these. The parties were inextricably entwined with each other for years to come, as lessee and management company of the claimant’s home. The claimant’s husband had even at one time been a director of the defendant company. The trial judge was found by the Court of Appeal to have got the main plank of the claimant’s case wrong, requiring large-scale reversal on the merits. The total damages awarded were just under £6,500, of which £1,250 was unchallenged on appeal. Etherton LJ starts the costs judgment with the words: “This is a very sad and unfortunate case, in which the costs of successful litigation far,