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Re-counting the costs

02 May 2019 / Simon Gibbs
Issue: 7838 / Categories: Features , Procedure & practice , Costs
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What constitutes a ‘good reason’ to depart from a costs budget? Simon Gibbs examines the evidence
  • In Barts Health NHS Trust v Salmon  the judge held that the failure to complete a phase was a ‘good reason’ to depart from the budget.

We are now starting to see an increasing number of decisions coming through as to what amounts to a ‘good reason’ to depart from a costs management order.

The decision in Barts Health NHS Trust v Salmon [2019] Lexis Citation 27 makes for particularly interesting reading.

This was a clinical negligence case. A costs management order had been made approving the claimant’s budget in the sum of £155,673. The claim settled before trial and where not all the phases of the original budget had been completed.

The claimant served a bill of costs where the costs claimed for a number of the phases were less than the amounts allowed in the approved budget for the corresponding phases.

For example, in respect of the experts phase, the budgeted sum was £24,928,

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