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26 October 2012 / Sam Nicholls , Alison Padfield
Issue: 7535 / Categories: Features , Insurance / reinsurance
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Fraud in insurance & fraud on insurers: a distinction without a difference, ask Alison Padfield & Sam Nicholls

Why should a claimant forfeit the whole of a fraudulently exaggerated claim made directly against an insurer under an insurance policy, but only forfeit the fraudulently exaggerated part of a civil claim in which the defendant is insured, with the damages to be paid (indirectly) by an insurer? This is the puzzle which remains after the Supreme Court’s decision in Fairclough Homes Limited v Summers [2012] UKSC 26.

The question of how to deal with a fraudulently exaggerated civil claim has a short—barely a decade—but interesting history (see Dominic Regan’s article “Damaged!”). In the law of insurance, on the other hand, the modern approach was established by Willes J in Britton v Royal Insurance Co (1866) 4 F & F 905. As Willes J explained, in a claim for goods consumed by fire: “It would be most dangerous to permit parties to practise such frauds, and then, notwithstanding their falsehood and

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NEWS
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Bea Rossetto of the National Pro Bono Centre makes the case for ‘General Practice Pro Bono’—using core legal skills to deliver life-changing support, without the need for niche expertise—in this week's NLJ
The Supreme Court issued a landmark judgment in July that overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo, once poster boys of the Libor and Euribor scandal. In NLJ this week, Neil Swift of Peters & Peters considers what the ruling means for financial law enforcement
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Charles Pigott of Mills & Reeve reports on Haynes v Thomson, the first judicial application of the Supreme Court’s For Women Scotland ruling in a discrimination claim, in this week's NLJ
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