GIBBINS

Following an request by the Court of Appeal in 2007, Courts have begun to develop and codify their costs-capping jurisdiction.  Under rules proposed by the Civil Procedure Rule Committee issued last week, Courts are expected to implement such capping, particularly in personal injury and defamation cases.  The committee said that the approach to cost-capping should be ‘conservative’ and orders should only be made in ‘exceptional circumsatbces’.

The draft rule says that an order can be made if it is in the interests of justice to do so and that a ’substantial risk’ that costs will be disproportionately incurred without it.  The committee went on to say that the risk could no be adequaltly controlled by case management powers or through the process of Detailed Assessment.