Croyde Area Residents Association v North Devon District Council
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mrs Justice Lieven DBE |
| Judgment Date | 23 March 2021 |
| Neutral Citation | [2021] EWHC 703 (Admin) |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/2368/2020 |
| Date | 23 March 2021 |
[2021] EWHC 703 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Mrs Justice Lieven
Case No: CO/2368/2020
The Queen on the Application of
and
Mr Richard Turney and Mr Alex Shattock (instructed by Richard Buxton Solicitors) for the Claimant
Mr Peter Wadsley (instructed by North Devon District Council) for the Defendant
Mr James Maurici QC and Ms Heather Sargent (instructed by Herbert Smith Freehills LLP) for the Interested Party
Hearing dates: 4 and 5 March 2021
Approved Judgment
This is a short judgment setting out my conclusions on the two outstanding issues on the order; whether the costs cap should include VAT and permission to appeal. The background to the case is fully set out in my judgment dated 19 March 2021.
After procedural orders had been made earlier in the proceedings by Sir Ross Cranston and Holgate J, the parties agreed a consent order on 19 November 2020 in the following terms:
“Any liability of the Defendant and Interested Party to pay costs in this action to the Claimant is capped at £35,000 + VAT (£42,000).” The reasons for this were set out in the recitals namely “AND UPON the Claimant applying, in its claim form and within its statement of facts and grounds, for an Aarhus Protective Costs Order within the meaning of 45.43 of the Civil Procedure Rules AND UPON the parties not contesting that this is an Aarhus claim”.
The Interested Party now applies for the costs order to be varied so that the costs liability is limited to £35,000 inclusive of VAT, i.e. with a totally liability of £35,000 not £42,000. The basis for this application is that on 13 January 2021 the Court of Appeal handed down judgment in R (Friends of the Earth) v Secretary of State for Transport [2021] EWCA Civ 13. The judgment concerned precisely the issue of whether CPR45.43 provided for the costs cap to be inclusive or exclusive of VAT.
At [33] – [36] the Court set out its reasons for finding that the cap was inclusive of VAT:
“First, that is the natural meaning of the words used in those provisions. The figures are set out as absolute amounts, without qualification.
34. Secondly, this construction is supported by the history of the consultation exercise and the response to it by the Government in the process which led up to the enactment of CPR 45.43.
35. Thirdly, it does not seem to us that this would impede or frustrate the implementation in domestic law of the Aarhus Convention. That Convention simply requires that the costs of environmental litigation such as this should not be prohibitive. It does not require a...
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