Latest Cases

Family proceedings – Orders in family proceedings. The Family Division made a declaration of parentage in favour of a father in circumstances where he and his partner had undergone IVF treatment using donor sperm and where they had signed the relevant consent forms. It had later transpired that they had signed consent forms under the 'old' scheme, but had commenced treatment after the 'new' scheme introduced by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 had come into effect. The court held that the signed forms were sufficient to comply with the requirements of the 2008 Act and operated a valid and effective consent notwithstanding the change in the statutory regime. 

Criminal law – Robbery. On a reference by the Attorney General, the Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, held that a sentence of four years' imprisonment for the robbery of a man in his home, had been unduly lenient. In the circumstances, the offender's sentence would be quashed and, in its place, a term of nine years' imprisonment would be imposed. 

Immigration – Leave to remain. The Administrative Court rejected the claimant Albanian national's challenges to the decision that she had not been trafficked, and to the defendant Secretary of State's decisions to certify her asylum claim on safe third-country grounds prior to a consideration of the trafficking claim and to detain her on her arrival in the United Kingdom. 

Personal Injury: Quantum Case. Employer's liability. PSLA of £70,500 with total damages of £662,358.02. The claimant was injured when he slipped and fell on ice at work. He experienced chronic regional pain syndrome, with poor prognosis and a 25% chance of future amputation of the foot. He also developed related depression. 

Negligence – Vehicles. The Queen's Bench Division allowed a claim for damages for personal injury and consequential loss following a vehicular collision which, through the events that followed, had resulted in the claimant's leg being amputated. The defendant was liable for the entirety of the incident which had flowed directly from his negligent act in reversing into the claimant without having kept a proper look out. The damages would be reduced by 60% to reflect the claimant's contributory negligence in having left his car's ignition on and the car in neutral, when he had gone to stand behind the car to inspect the damage. 

Contract – Construction of contract. The Financial List considered issues concerning the rights attaching to the Class X note in a commercial mortgage-backed securitisation structure called 'Windermere VII', which had been arranged by Lehman Brothers International (Europe) in 2006. It rejected the claimant note holder's contention that the terms of an intercreditor agreement disclosed a mistake, which could be corrected by construction or by implication of words. It held, among other things, that there had not been an underpayment of the Class X interest amount for the January 2015 or October 2015 payment dates for loans made under the CMBS structure and no event of default had occurred as a consequence. 

Compensation – Crime. The Court of Appeal, Civil Division, dismissed the claimants' appeals against the dismissal of their claims for judicial review, seeking a declaration of incompatibility between s 133(1ZA) of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 and art 6(2) of the European Convention on Human Rights (art 6(2)). The Divisional Court had been right to have held that the ratio of the decision in R (Adams) v Secretary of State for Justice ([2011] 3 All ER 261) (Adams) on the art 6(2) issue was that art 6(2) was not applicable to the operation of s 133 of the Act, whatever definition of 'miscarriage of justice' was adopted. Adams was binding precedent on that point and that remained the position regardless of any subsequent observations of the European Court of Human Rights in Allen v United Kingdom ((2013) 36 BHRC 1) and later cases. 

European Union – Public procurement. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling concerning the interpretation of arts 2, 44 and 48(3) of Directive (EC) 2004/18. The request had been made in proceedings between Partner Apelski Dariusz (Partner) and the Warsaw municipal cleansing authority concerning Partner's exclusion from the procedure for the award of a public contract for the comprehensive mechanical cleansing of roadways of the city of Warsaw (Poland) in the years from 2014 to 2017. 

Criminal law – Trial. In an appeal against an order imposed under s 4(2) of the Contempt of Court Act 1981, the case, for the first time, raised the question of how critical fair trial protections could be extended to prevent or control communications on social media. In the circumstances, the Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, revoked the s 4(2) order and ordered the various media organisations not to place any report of the criminal trial on their Facebook page(s), and, to disable the ability for users to post comments on their respective news websites on any published reports of the criminal trial. 

Counsel – Duty. The Administrative Court upheld the defendant Legal Ombudsman's determination, criticising the claimant barrister's handling of the interested party's formal complaint letter in his own letter. However, it quashed the remainder of the determination, including the decision to award the interested party the equivalent of her costs in the claimant's county court action against her for unpaid fees.